The Roman Empire
by TheButterflyComposer
Summary: The Scipii never wished to be anything more than faithful servants of Rome. Unfortunately, the Senate didn't see it that way...
1. The Battle for Sicily

No one man knows the extent to which his actions will weave the tapestry of history. So too it was with the Scipii, firstborn of Rome's trading houses. Who could have known the breadth of their majesty, the scale of their might in the years to come? Certainly not the young Cornelius Scipio and his four sons, when they first set out from their home city of Capua to deal with some small dispute on the small Isle of Sicily...

The Greeks! Ah the Greeks, those creators of civilisation! How their lustre had faded through the years since Alexander's death. Now their city of Syracuse was proving troublesome to the Republic's efforts to colonise the island and create a trade city. As it was, there were also reports that a wicked African state had posted its own settlement on the far side of the island. Troubled by these reports, the great Senate saw fit to bid the Scipii to 'deal' with the situation as they saw fit.

Cornelius called for his good friend Gaius of the Julii family to scout out the other islands nearby to see if the rumours of this African state were true, whilst he sent his firstborn Aulus and his second child Gaius to talk with the Greeks.

Ah, but the Greeks were arrogant and foolish in their dealings and sent away the diplomats and offers of trading, preferring instead to attack the now confirmed alien presence on the island. The head of the Julii also brought bad news to Rome and to Cornelius. There was another sea faction out there and they were the Carthaginians. What was more, they had repulsed the Julii landing party and gathered ships to destroy their scouting fleet off the coast of Italy.

Franticly, Cornelius sent for all of his available vessels to defend the Julii and destroy the enemy fleet. This, unknown at the time, could well have been an action that saved Rome and the Julii family from utter destruction.

Facing war with both the Carthaginians and the Greeks, Aulus and Gaius unperturbed set about besieging the city of Syracuse, leaving Quintus, a third son, to scout the rest of the island. In this aim, he was remarkably successfull, establishing a whole host of watchtowers that allowed both the Julii and the Scipii to watch the seas for invaders and pirates. The fall of Syracuse came soon afterwards, with Aulus returning to govern his city of Messana and Gaius ruling from the newly captured one. Quintus rallied the remaining troops and obliterated first a weak scouting party from the Carthaginians and then taking their poorly defended mud and wood huts as well.

The Senate was well pleased with the resulting gifts and trade with the entirety of the island but was unsatisfied, for half their members were of the Brutii House, and they were unimpressed by the new family's war on a mere two towns. They were even more disparaging of the Julii, an attitude that hurt both their houses in the long run. Undaunted, the Scipii were offered aid by the grateful Julii in capturing their next target, Caralis.

This, the only settlement on the Isle, was of vital importance to the defence of Rome, as it allowed for a greater naval base and military presence in the Mediterranean, a sea the Romans all wished to control. The newly matured (and soon to be great) Julianus Scipio took command of the task force and took the small trading hub with not one man lost amongst his men.

Now the Scipii had obtained, with little effort, an Island home of their own along with a potential second trading village, they looked south westerly to the insidious new threat that was even now planning insidious countermoves: Carthage itself.


	2. The Battle for Africa Part I

The Julii in the meantime, had been handed defeat after defeat against marauding Gauls and rebels, struggling to even land a victory against a rebellious base of operations at Segesta. North of the river, the Gauls reigned unopposed and Italy looked extremely vulnerable to the Brutii-led Senate.

Worse was to come for the Roman Republic however, as reports circulated down from the barbarians of a new power from the High North, from a small island above Gaul...

The Scipii sent out scouts and spies to the mainland of Africa to observe and report back on the Carthage threat. It was feared that they, being unusually strong even in small numbers and with a fast, flexible phalanx formation, may have already conquered the whole of the North Coast. Those fears were unfounded however, as the scouts reported back to their disbelieving masters that a _larger_ Kingdom existed and it was, by all observations given, far weaker and poorer than the three Carthage cities on the East Coast (unfortunately, the closest location to Roman territory).

It was therefore Julianus and his host that sailed across to the lands of the Numidians and met their first army in battle. Striking hard at the capital Tingi from the sea, the Numidian king and his army were put to the sword and his country went into disarray.

Carthage, ignorant of all of this, accepted a surprise ceasefire and trading envoy from the Roman Senate and the Scipii. With the sea routes relatively safe, the Julii stood down their navy and concentrated on building up an army to push the Gauls out of Italy. The Brutii left to fight the Greeks in their homeland, unknowingly beginning a war that would end in both stalemate and economic ruin. And the Scippii? They continued to push eastwards towards the enemy, Carthage, all the while capturing the remnants of Numidian cities and defeating the scattered armies of their nobles. Critically from a historical perspective, it was at this moment that they became custodians of defending the seas and maintains the Roman navy.

When it became apparent that Gaius and Aulus were infertile, Quintus sent his own sons to aid the rapidly advancing Julianus in capturing Africa. Aulus later adopted two captains into his home and taught them all he knew about management. Gaius (the First) remained both unmarried and childless till the day he died, but was eventually remembered as a great faction leader and economic reformer.

Cornelius was not idle in Capua all this time. He and his diplomats strove to find all the great and the small tribes and kingdoms in the world and trade with them. So successful were they in this endeavour that the Julii never needed to scout to find settlements in the North, and the Brutii always had up to date information on other faction's powers in the East.

Gaul was eventually determined to be untameable by the Julii and so they ceased expansion westwards after taking Mediolanium and thus freeing Italy forever from Gaul control. Instead, they ascended the mountains and fought the German tribes, eventually reaching the sea again in the High North.

The Brutii in the meanwhile were fighting the Dacians, the Greek City States that had unified against them and worse of all, the Kingdom of Macedonia, the true heirs of Alexander and for a time, the mightiest warriors on Earth. The Brutii progress eastwards was slow and gruelling, expending all of their gold on reinforcing troops and defences for their new territories.

Because of this, the Senate began more and more to rely on the only wealthy main House, the Scipii. Cornelius and Gaius entered the great halls of Rome as Consuls and since then, no session of the Senate was without at least two Scipii men in office.

Cornelius began to age and knew that he was not long for the world of Men. After making it clear among his sons that they must not fight each other for the title, he made Aulus head of the family and left with a few ships to conquer his last territory, Plama. With his victory over Carthage's last holding outside of Africa, he had secured the Mediterranean as Roman, essentially won the trading war between his House and Carthage and established the Scipii as not just a trading family but as the Republic's finest servants.

Six months after his death, the Julii witnessed an event that sent shockwaves around the Republic.


	3. The Battle for Africa Part II

Those Gauls, with their great hordes and destructive cavalry, were thought of as both impervious to assault and impossible to defeat in war by the Julii. All Roman efforts to cross into their territory failed and not even the German tribes of the North could fight them effectively. Hence the expansion into said tribes, they were seen as the weakest link in the chain of barbarian kingdoms that spanned from the Spanish in the south to Scythia in the Far North East.

Now though, reports came in of a new power, capable of utterly destroying entire Gallic armies. Sceptical of the thought, the new Julii commander sent a few scouts into northern Gaul territory to disprove the rumours amongst his scared troops.

They returned with white faces and shaking limbs. Translated from the Latin scrolls, we know they reported back with words of: "_Death_," they said, "_Death has come to the land and is unleashed upon the Enemy._"

The commander rose from his seat and questioned them on their curious and fearful statement. It turned out that the island faring people north of Gaul were real and appearing in great numbers across the Gallic coast. They had already destroyed three armies and were marching towards the south with great speed.

The commander's warnings went unheeded by the Brutii as they continued to struggle on three fronts against their enemies. Gaius I, who was now Consul and faction leader both, saw fit to send envoys to the Scipii's ally Spain to see what they knew of the terror from the north. The Spaniards replied that they were the Britons, and already in an alliance with them to help remove the invading Gauls from their lands.

Worried by the power change in Europe, Gaius immediately began constructing a new army in Capua '_for_ _the defence_ _of_ _Rome_ _herself_' and ordered all commanders in the field to end the war with Carthage quickly.

By this time, Numidia was no more and Carthage had defended itself fiercely from attack. Their navy was far greater in numbers to the Scipii's, the only Roman Navy now in the Mediterranean, and their walls held firm against long sieges.

Finally, their leader Hannibal was trapped outside of Carthage and cut down by Julianus, a feat that earned him not only Carthage, a greater city than even Rome at the time, but also the title of Faction leader. The Senate rewarded him further, becoming the first Scipio to become Censor.

With that last crushing defeat, Carthage folded as a power and by the end of the cold season, Africa belonged solely to Rome. This led to a period of immense wealth for the Scipii as their armies retired and left to build farms and cities, and as their families governed so they grew. In five years, only two skirmish armies were active, both to destroy any rebels that popped up on the well mapped and watched African mainland. The navy was also decreased in size but only to give way to the First Fleet, a full line of Quinquireme that easily dominated the sea and pirates that sailed upon her. Now only the Scipii were present in the Mediterranean and their own private ocean brought them nothing but wealth and happiness.

The same could not be said for the other families of the great Roman Republic. The Brutii were laughed at in the streets of the city they once ruled alone. Near bankruptcy and no nearer to defeating the Macedonians, they surrendered and consigned themselves to holding a mere fraction of the west of Greece and about half of the Dacian territory.

The Julii had been shattered into two, the upmost northern provinces of Germania and the main Julii holdings further south, by a massive invasion of the Britons. They destroyed any who resisted and got as far as the Julii/Brutii border before relenting, for unknown reasons at the time.

In fact, all Barbarian factions seemed to be on the increase and civilisation itself seemed to be cursed by the gods above. Spain removed Guak from rebel hands and became a Kingdom itself, Scythia absorbed the Thracians into their ranks and fought against the Macedonians for a time, even winning an unbelievable victory against the Parthians, who lost all of their territory North of the Eastern mountains to them.

And then, there was the Britons. Now forging what the historians would later dub the '_British_ _Imperium_', they conquered ALL of Gaul in less than two years, completely eclipsing the Scipii and Julii accomplishments and calling into question the defence of Italy, so soon after it had been secured. The Julii were reeling from their territory being split, the Brutii had been shamed and weakened in a pointless war and were now surrounded by enemies and the Scipii were unable to aid either but watch helplessly as the British stormed the fort defences to the north of Pavatium and then took the city itself. Mediolanium too fell and it appeared that Rome would die a horrible death at the hands of the barbarians.

Yet again, mysteriously the horde dispersed and left for Gaul again, despite having conquered all within. The Scipii resolved to meet with the leaders of this new 'empire' and discuss matters of peace, for the sake of the Republic.

Little did they know that the British were only getting started.


	4. The Struggle for Mastery in Europe

The king of the Britons, Theodric, was receptive to the Scipii and their envoy. He too wished for trade and peace amongst such two clearly great people's. However, he also warned the Scipii not to sail into the Northern Sea or try and prevent trade between their cities. Along with assurance from the two powers and some trade and map agreements, their shared ally Spain resolved to aid development between the two. With the British in control over their island and Gaul, the Spanish over Spain and the Scipii in Africa, a great trade network was planned out and maintained by the Scipii fleets.

Ah yes, the fleets! The true wonders of that age were created by Flavius, Julianus's son and new ruler of the Scipio dynasty. His was a mind that had known only expansion, wealth and peace, and so he was more distant with the other Roman factions and with the Senate itself, never taking part in its affairs and ignoring many of their directives. It was here, with his construction of the Second, Third and Fourth fleets in Scicly, that Flavius essentially took the Scipii from being servants of the Republic to an empire in their own right.

First, he sent the First Fleet to patrol the Western Mediterranean Sea, thus ensuring trade flow and the compete absence of pirates for the first time in recorded history. The Second and Third Fleets were built to expand his influence in the Eastern half of the Mediterranean, of which no Roman had really sailed through before. And the Fourth? The Fourth was the most important from a historical perspective, as this was the fleet that carried Scipii's army away from Africa and onto Crete, the first land they had conquered without dictation by the Senate.

With Kydonia established as a base of operations, the eastern expansion began in earnest as the Scipii island hopped to Rhodes and then, critically, to Cyprus. Unlike the tragic and resonant battle at Rhodes, in which the last Greek king stood brave and proud against his opponents, Cyprus was the gateway to a whole new kind of warfare the Scipii were unprepared for.

In mainland Europe, the Macedonians, recent allies of the Scipii, began to push into Scythian territory and in so doing doubled their kingdom's size and wealth. The Julii and the Brutii finally launched a coordinated strike against the British, landing both a new territory each (although it was of course reclaimed from the Julii's viewpoint). The lack of rebuttal from the mighty British army (their military was thrice the size of any other faction in the world) led to paranoia and fear, enough even to take Flavius' attention away from the eastern expansion in curiosity.

Their answer came from a single charred Spanish vessel with only three men still alive onboard. The British had, impossibly, annexed Spain in secret and was now hurdling all of its combined might right at the Roman forces in Germania. To say that the Julii and Brutii panicked would be an understatement but they held firm like a wall of ice and held back the hordes of now heavily armoured and experienced barbarians. In a further victory, they decapitated Theodric, the unifier of these men and sent the empire he had built into disarray.

Capitalising on these successes, the Julii broke through and did what was long thought impossible, capturing a settlement in Gaul on the south coast called Massilia. The Brutii in the meantime, fought desperately against the British forces to maintain the Julii's northern territory's.

But for the first time in history, it seemed as though Rome could remain secure and her armies could defeat the barbarians on her doorstep. This new mindset led to the election of the Julii's first consul and office holder, and the Scipii breathed a collective sigh of relief and began building the Home Fleet, to take their now defunct legion defending the capital to the eastern provinces, where trouble was brewing in Eygpt...


	5. The First Egyptian War

Rome was in celebration after the victories in Europe. New ideas in weaponry and armour had spread throughout the Republic and made the Legions far more effective, allowing the Julii, with Brutii assistance, to reclaim much of its old territory from the British.

The African provinces were free from rebels and overfilled with gold and people, so Flavius the Builder began to train new armies in Carthage, Thaspus and in Sicily, along with rearming the defence legion in Rome with the new weapons and armour they had developed. He knew that his family's former strategy of a small effective fighting force and a navy to keep the trade flowing would not be effective in the war that was brewing in the East.

The Scipii knew about the Egyptians from both their diplomats and Carthage's records. They had watched with first interest and then mounting concern as Pontus and Parthia fought each other over the fate of a small Client Kingdom: Armenia. Egypt on the other hand, was free from external threats and expanded at a fast rate towards these old empires.

The Armenians, sensing their chance, took their small but seemingly invincible army and conquered the Parthian's eastern provinces, eventually controlling the far edge of the known world from the eastern mountains to the endless Arabian desert.

Parthia, greatly weakened, fell to the Armenian and Pontic kings. Before Pontus could organise or rebuild however, the Egyptians struck. They had agreed to leave the eastern desert to Armenia and taken the more valuable coastal path to the Pontic lands.

Scipii, remembering the chaos caused by the arrival of a new threat, and afraid of another hostile empire being formed, invaded the Egyptian capital and military stronghold of Cyprus. How can I describe the magnificence of the Isle? It was truly one city, walled from coast to coast and heavily defended to all attacks.

The task seemed impossible and yet the great Tiberius Scipio, son of Flavius, accomplished it. With spies weaving throughout the fortifications, ships circling the besieged island and armies pressing down upon them, the walls fell and the island with them. Fortune however, smiled on their pharaoh, as he and his war cabinet were not at the island at the time, instead overseeing the conquest of Pontus itself.

Macedon, hearing the sounds of war, joined their Roman ally and invaded the Eygptian homeland, but were quickly repulsed by the town garrisons in the area. Their fleets however made splinters out of the Egyptians in the Black Sea, which they nearly fully controlled now.

Tiberius died on Cyprus, leaving Flavius both heartbroken and eventually, terminally ill. His heir, Gaius Scipio the Second, resolved to attack the Egyptian homeland next, correctly calculating that the majority of their forces and generals were in Pontus fighting. The legions from Carthage and Thaspus combined and marched on the border between them and the Egyptians. They received aid from the Sicily legion that landed from the sea not far from Alexandria. With little effort and almost no resistance, the entirety of Egypt west of the Nile river fell to the Scipii.

Gaius wished to halt or at least appose the Egyptian conquest of Pontus as well, so with cover from the Macedonian navy, he sent the conquerors of Cyprus to Asia Minor and took Perganum for their own. The enraged Pharaoh sent his son, his army and some skirmish forces to dislodge the invasion.

This was a critical moment in the war. If Egypt won here, Pontus would fall and Egypt would be able to focus fully on the Scpii. If the Scipii won, Pontus would still fall, but the Scipii would have not only delayed the inevitable but demonstrably proven the dominancy of Rome over the Pharaoh and almost certainly sway Armenia to the diplomatic table.

Unfortunately for the Romans, they were in no position to resist. Their army strength was less than half and their leader was dead and buried in Cyprus. Dutifully, they marched out of the city and faced the armies of Egypt on an open plain.

Unbeknownst to them, the other army was having troubles of their own. The reinforcements were delayed (and indeed, would only enter the battle halfway through), the son was inexperienced and his troops were terrified of the unbeatable Scipii army (which had lost ships to pirates before, but had never suffered defeat on land).

Battle was met and the Scipii held their line, but it crumpled under a chariot charge. Their archers emptied their quivers and continued fighting hand to hand, striking from hidden bushes and trees. The lone horse unit single handedly routed over five batches of desert are men before being cut down. Before long, both armies were exhausted and so too were the reinforcements. However, it was the Scipii who rallied and emerged victorious, losing half their remaining men to ensure the total destruction of the enemy and the Pharaoh's son.

When the dust settled, the scouts for the Egyptian leadership could not believe the scale of the battle nor that their whole army and all their skirmisers were dead. With his son gone, only three armies remaining in his empire and every ship of his being destroyed by Macedonians and Romans, the Pharaoh begged for peace and paid the Scipii one quarter of his entire wealth to buy it.

Thus ended the First Egyptian war and also an age for the Scipii. They had gone from the Senate's traders to Rome's finest servants, and now they were unmatched on the sea, master of Africa and had humbled the dominant power in Asia. They held the alliance and friendship of another up and coming power and the respect of a potential Client Kingdom.

Thus began the first true Roman Empire.


	6. A Fragile Peace

In the years following the end of the war in Egypt, the Roman families all decided to ramp up their military spending. The British still possessed the world's largest military force, yet all three factions were galloping up to their level, with almost every large city in the Republic training and recruiting and constructing. This amounted to the Brutii having nearly the same sized infantry body as a much larger empire, with the Julii and Scipii almost equal in number.

The Macedonians were also keen to create more troops, first to continue their conquest of the remaining two settlements of Scythia, and also to control the border between themselves and the Brutii. Whilst they were not as successful in rapidly mobilising their units due to the nature of their army setup, they still possessed the fifth largest army in the world and the second largest navy.

The Egyptians were the only other remaining large scale Kingdom left, with the Pontics all but destroyed, the Scythains in much the same position and the Armenians holding a fairly large but barren wasteland beyond anyone else's interests. The Pharoh continued the plan of destroying Pontus but could not afford a greater military, being able only to replace the dead men with new ones for what was turning into a fairly well equipped but extremely inexperienced fighting force.

With the gains in the East and no challengers in sight, the Scipii now possessed more land than the British, whom had lost their gains in Roman territory and were now back to their own territories of Gaul, Spain and the homelands to the north. Macedon possessed much as it already had, which made its holding roughly the same size as the British, but with far greater and larger cities at its disposal. Egypt, for all its losses, still possessed its empire, sans the homeland Scipii now controlled, albeit at a price of a guttered economy and a small population crisis due to all the fighting.

The Julii had never possessed much land, only enough to defend Italy usually and yet thanks to the efforts of the Brutii, it had retained the northern provinces that kept British troops pinned down in a nasty, inglorious skirmish war. The Brutii had actually gone from stagnation in the east to taking all of the Julii's lost territory from the British, making it regain some of the wealth and lustre it once had.

Unfortunately for the entire world but especially the Republic, the economy of the Scipii had been obliterated from nearly 3.2 million denarii to 23,000 over the past ten years, making the trade networks and the endless battle for wealth die a horrible death. It had only just finished sinking in to both the man on the street and the king in his counting house on how much the Scipii had carried trade and the economies of every nation on her back and in her fleets. Without the buying power of her cities, everyone found themselves a little poorer, with only the Brutii, the Senate and the Egyptians managing to be anything but economically depressed.

Noting this, the Senate convened and demanded steps be taken to fix the world's greatest economy. Despite protestations on Gaius' part, it was pointed out by the Julii that most of the trade on the oceans was ran through and protected by Scipii ships, most if not all of the rare trading items were owned by Britain or the Scipii and the Scipii also had the most members in the Senatorial offices at the time (all three of the top jobs). Reluctantly, Gaius agreed and set about organising what was now (in name alone) the Republic's African and Eastern Provinces.

This was problematic for a few reasons, chief among which was that the great family which now ruled this sprawling land was now barely Scipii in name. Only Gaius himself, his son Numerius (barely a child) and a distant cousin were direct descendants of Cornelius. Even with the new, more numerous sides to the family (the Aquillius branch and the Suetonius branch were began by the sterile sons of Cornelius), Gaius did not posses enough governors for his cities and none at all for his armies.

This meant that to have a hope of fixing his financial status and make expansion viable again, he would have to invent a civil service and meritocratic system to run his holdings efficiently. Implementing the service took time and money, and still did not solve the problem of the armies, which were now being captained by 'generals' not of the family. This meant that the Republic's practice of gifting land to retirees would have to be copied and adapted by the Scipii themselves, which was unorthodox in that it meant officially admitting the Republic did not control the armies, he did.

In spite of Senate opposition, he did so, causing another link with Rome to be broken irrevocably. Still, after a mere 80 years, the Scipii had left both the Republic and the _idea_ of a Republic far behind.

The results spoke for themselves. In a mere six months, the finances of the Scipii shot up and stood at half of their maximum wealth of a decade previously. This rapid response to and sucess over a crisis made the Scipii immensely popular with the Mob in Rome and with the people across the world.

The peace, such as it was, lasted a mere three seasons before war reared its ugly head yet again. This time however, the Scipii were marching against the British.


	7. Britannia's Folly?

You see, in the years before, a British spy had been placed on the Isle of Palma, the closest Isle to Spain itself. When the spy was eventually caught, the governor, Manius Carinus reported the findings to Gaius in Africa, only to find his island under attack by two bands of slingers from mainland Spain!* A gathering of cavalry quickly polished off the invaders but the damage had been done and the Scipii were now on the warpath.

*A side note: It is unclear precisely _why_ the British sent a slinger squad to the Scipii Island they had been spying on for decades. Conspiracy theories about the other Roman families framing the British, or the Scipii themselves making up the whole affair remain unfounded but persistent to this day.*

Whomever was responsible picked either the worst or the best time for the attack, as the Scipii had just completed the reconstruction of their two great legions in Capua and in Carthage, and even had a fleet ready to ship the Capua legion wherever they needed to go. The two legions active in the former Egyptian homeland stayed put by Gaius' direct order, as he was not done with _that_ empire yet, nor their king, for slaying his twin brother Tiberius and killing his father Flavius with grief.

The British, having lost their final territory inside Roman land, realised the fullness of their 'error' extremely quickly (lending further suspicion to the idea it was not they who truly attacked Palma). Decimus Scipio, the ruler of Capua, was in no mood for peace talks and practically ordered them to sign some harsh penalties for daring to fight the Scipii, along with some newer, more biased trade agreements. He also demanded territory in Spain and ordered all British ships (including trade vessels) out of the Mediterranean Sea.

The British, despite being newly afraid of the might of the Roman armies, refused such degrading terms and left in a flurry of bugles and war cries. The war with Britain was all but confirmed now and would yet be forestalled again and again by both sides for a variety of reasons.

Gaius was willing to forestall the planned second invasion of Egypt, focusing on their gains in the Middle East this time, but under pressure from the Senate and their allies in Macedonia, they blockaded the port of Halicarnasus and began hostilities anew.

With the regained economic might available, Gaius inflicted trade as a brutal weapon against their people, cutting off _all_ overseas trade (as Macedon and Rome were the only civilisations Egypt could trade with), blockading every port and seizing every Egyptian ship they could find, which bound them ever closer to Armenia, which used this to full effect to get even greater 'gifts' from the desperate Egyptian Government.

The Ponitc War was still raging onwards as the last two strongholds fought madly against the enroaching Egyptain armies, knowing that every moment they were delaying the enemy, the more time the Scipii had to deploy its own troops. In the south however, the invading legions were astounded to find not even a trace of resistance or sign of an army. Neither Gaius nor any other family member had guessed at how much the Egyptians had lost in the first conflict, but no one truly believed they had seriously damaged the mighty Egyptian military in so short a time. It turned out they had however, with only three armies left to Egypt's name and all of which were circling Pontus cities.

In Europe, the promise of support from the Scipii emboldened the tired troops of the Julii, who swiftly invaded Gaul itself, and penetrated deeply into its forests. From the south, the main Julii force also attacked, besieging Narbo Martius and beating back a large army of Britons, although their general lived to fight another day.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian army continued to be absent from the south. One legion besieged Bostra and the other was given the high honour of attacking a crucial and extremely valuable city (especially in these modern days of ours) : Jerusalem.

A dust storm hit the city of Bostra as the attack began. The high stone walls and towers looking imposing to the villagers inside yet to the soldiers attacking, they were merely obstacles. Adopting the same tactics used many times over, the cohorts dug under the walls and destroyed a large portion, forcing the defenders to flee in panic. Forming testudo's, the soldiers broke through the first militia and took the rest of the walls as their own.

The systematic destruction of the town guard followed, with the legion commander taking special note of how the walls thickened, how their towers were ranged and how their streets were laid out. They were different from the other cities they had already fought in, meaning the Egyptian cities were all ancient places of differing designs and defence levels. This meant that having a general tactic for taking them was impossible, as some were extremely well defended and built, such as the entirety of Cyprus, yet others were little more than mud huts and wooden walls.

Bostra's fall marked an end to the Scipii's fears of an Egyptian Empire of the East. Their government and army style were simply too weak and not vigilant enough to even defend themselves from invasion, a problem shared by all of the Eastern factions encountered, save for Armenia, the land the Romans now had a direct border with.

Despite tales of harsh treatment among the massively overpopulated Egyptian cities and wild rumours of ethnic cleansing, the Armenian king granted an audience with Gaius II himself and his chief diplomats. Whilst their dealings went on, an excited messenger broke in, telling a delighted audience that the siege of Narbo Martius had ended...with a Julii victory. Now Gaul was very nearly cut off from Spain and the British were facing the very real possibility of losing both parts of their empire. All it would take for them to fall was a Scipii invasion of Spain.

An invasion that was already on its way.


	8. The Second Egyptian War Part I

As the invasion fleet to Spain stalled in the waters around Carthage Nova, waiting for another round of peace talks to either succeed or fail, the second legion began advancing towards Jerusalem. The capture of Bostra might have downgraded the opinion the Scipii held of the Egyptians but the absent military power finally struck a surprise blow on the second legion, before the epic walls of Jerusalem.

It seemed the Pharaoh had decided that the invasion of his lands had gone on for far too long and far too successfully to be ignored, and so sent a sizeable force under two trusted captains to aid the defenders. The Battle for Jerusalem, as it became infamous for, enshrined how the rest of the war would play out for both sides.

Jerusalem herself was a great and powerful city already, by far the largest city in the East and the jewel in the crown of the Egyptian Empire. Its walls were as numerous and as thick as the Scipii citadel cities of Scilly, making undermining and assault impossible. The legion therefore built giant towers to put alongside the walls, a plan that was put on hold as the Egyptian reinforcements came to attack.

Leaving the walls, the Romans took refuge on a high hill, drawing both the city defenders and the relief force towards their ranks. Seeing the entire opposition below them, they opened fire with everything they had. The cavalry section left the hill and flanked the enemy ranks, waiting for an opening. They immediately found one in the onagers that were poised to bombard the hillside. Left at the back and undefended, the men were on them like wolves to sheep.

The largely skirmish-made city force was next, being shot at by both arrows from the front and cavalry spears from the rear. The first 'army' fell even before the reinforcements arrived.

A second pair of Onagars fell before the mighty cavalry charge, with the Egyptians recognising the threat the horses were and targeting them personally. By now it was clear that Egypt's reliance on skirmishes and ranged units were a critical weakness in their army design when fighting the Romans, but also that a Scipii army without horses (something of a common occurrence within normal Roman conventions) was slow and vulnerable.

The eradication of the few spear troops attempting to climb the hill followed, leaving almost the entirety of Egypt's army dead and fewer than 10% of the Romans. Jerusalem fell with no fight in her streets and the city was taken undamaged and with little civil unrest. The aftermath showed just how complete the dominance of the Scipii was over the Egyptian military and Egypt was shamed by another humiliation.

Unfortunately, this relief force was actually merely the scouting party a large two army complex returning along the coast. When the Scipii scouts took control of the watchtower, they saw with shock in their faces how a mighty horde of gold and silver armoured men were descending on their conquered lands.

The second war for Egypt had only just begun.


	9. The Second Egyptian War Part II

The armies in the south were a concern for the Scipii only in that it meat the Pontic war was either a success for the Egyptians or on hold. Gaius determined that there were only so many armies in Egypt left standing and based off of the reports and actions Egypt had taken, it seemed they all traveled together in a large cluster. Said cluster was now bearing down on Jerusalm and the southern invasion, which left the forgotten and slow western invasion through Asia Minor to carry on unimpaired by resistance.

So it came to pass that the army at Pergamum rode out to attack Sardis, home of the Temple of Artemis. There were two reasons for this target instead of going north to where the Pontic resistance was last known to be. First, the Madedonians would be extremely grateful for the removal of barbarians from the Greek temple and secondly, the Scipii did not wish to embroil itself in the Pontic war, rather take advantage of it for their own ends.

A problem that was not foreseen when taking the Nile was the River and Red Sea Fleet Egypt possessed that was now blockading all three trading ports in the Red Sea. None of these ports were currently capable of building the favoured Quinquireme ships, so the Romans used the now rather ancient designs of smaller vessels to begin fighting with the cut-off Egyptians. The rewards far exceeded the troubles however. Petra and Thebes became trading powerhouses as the traded with the relatively unknown Southern African States, whomever they may be, and the East's economy began to balance between trading on the Red Sea and along the Nile, and with on the Mediterranean itself, just as it had done so very long ago when the Egyptians were confined to their homelands.

The First legion in Egypt prevented the enemy armies from reaching the recently captured Jerusalem by first hitting them in their flank from the east, causing the mercenaries among them to panic and run to the west. The general in charge eventually restored order but by that time they were miles from Jerusalem and the Scipii were blockading the road that led to it.

This battle in the hills by the sea was the first time a fully prepared large scale Egyptian army led by a general came into contact with the Scipii legions. It would go on to be a horrific loss of life for the Egyptian Empire and a further glory to heave onto the great golden pile of Rome.

The battle was an utter disaster, with the entire Egyptian army including its general dead, with a mere 3% of the Scipii forces killed. This was the moment where the war in Egypt went from clear cut victory to absolute slaughter. No more would an Egyptian army attack a settlement without fearing their whole army might die. Never again would the Scipii think of the possibility of losing a battle against these desert rats. Egypt, though still commanding two armies and her king, was utterly crushed.

The rapid fall of Sardis in the eastern campaign highlighted the ineffectiveness of Egypt to defend herself, causing Armenia to ignore her alliance with them and began conquering weakened Pontic States of her own. Sidon in the south however, was defended, by the Pharaoh's heir nonetheless, with his great army. The Second legion were undaunted however, and went on to destroy his army and the prince himself.

By now the war had become something of a joke to the Scipii and complete victory was all but certain. However, the economy reared its ugly head again and soon Gaius was facing yet another angry committee of both his own civil servants and the Senate. The Scipii economy had, from its steadily recovering phase, gone quickly down below the levels it had been at the end of the First Egyptian War. Gaius was told that under no circumstances could the Scipii economy go into negative figures or the whole world would be under threat. The Brutii were the only other sizeable economy left in the world apart from Britain, and their own fortunes were decreasing rapidly due to military expenditure. But the Scipii had a higher responsibility; to keep the trade networks open and free from pirates, and to pay the majority of the Republic's taxes with both her trading empire and her riches.

Gaius was enraged. His grand designs had finally come to fruition, he possessed the largest empire with the greatest army and navy in the world and the enemy he fought, the slayers of his kin, were at his feet, begging for mercy as he slaughtered his way through them. When he saw his own city suffer from the blight of poverty however, his heart softened and he returned to his advisors, willing to listen.

The situation was grim. Scipii needed the development funds for the newly captured territory and for feeding the new Eastern provinces. It also HAD to maintain most of her naval forces, for both her own and Rome's sake. Some cuts were made to the naval powerhouse; the Red Sea relief force was retired for example, her task done. The Macedonians had proven their command of the Black Sea over Egypt and so two support fleets in the Eastern Mediterranean were retired, leaving two main battle fleets to fight the remnants of the Egyptian navy.

At a time of war, all the five legions were needed, particularly in the fight against British tyranny. So it was at this time a plan formed to take the Spanish lands for the Scipii to both greatly weaken the barbarian empire. It would also put a use to the invasion armies that were created to aid in the Egyptian conflict, standing idle now said war was essentially won. As a bonus, Gaius stood to gain all the Spanish mines and trading ports that were the only remaining competitors to Roman merchants in the Western Mediterranean.

With the Armenians seemingly happy, the Macedonians making full headway into Scythia and the Egyptians beaten back once again, the British would soon fall too, wouldn't they?


	10. The Struggle for Mastery in Europe II

Thanks to some financial brilliance by the god-like Septimius, the Scipii economy began to climb upwards once again. Two fleets filled with troops were making speedy progress towards the Iberian coast, one made up of the African Legion sourced from Carthage and the other, the reformed Home Legion, now named the European Legion, headed by General Mamilus.

The struggle for mastery in Europe was not solely with the Romans and the British. The Brutii and Macedonians had been vying for years to outdo each other in both military might and economic prowess. It was questionable who was the greater power at the beginning of the Roman invasions into Gaul, but all knew that only the Scipii reigned above the two, with the Julii not far behind either one. Indeed, to defend Rome herself from British incursions before liberating great scores of land had made the Julii army the same size as the Scipii Legions. All four factions alternated between who was the greatest military power, with the Senate and the British looking on forlornly from the sidelines.

Overall, it was uncertain who was the greater of the powers in Europe, hence the war itself. Whomever won the decaying empire the British had left would become dominant, just as the Scipii had in the East.

The Brutii may have been that power, alas for them that rebellions struck across the Roman/Macedonian border, causing their attention to turn away from the desirable rewards of the west. Satisfied that their competitor was likewise engaged, the Macedonians turned their attention elsewhere as well, seeking to fully conquer Scythia and perhaps even joining the war against the Egyptians on land as well as on sea.

So it came to be that Julii alone, the least of Rome's families, took up the mantle of responsibility and headed deeper into Gaul, seeking to severe the former kingdom of Spain from the rest of the Empire, making its conquest all the more easy for the Scipii reinforcements they knew now to be incoming from the east.

With the economy still teetering on the edge and the advisors bearing down on him, Gaius reluctantly retired the Western Mediterranean fleet and the second African skirmish army, which was working to destroy rebels in the provinces. This left no police on the Sea for the first time in decades and only the First Skirmish Army to keep the peace on land in Africa.

The massively overpopulated cities captured in the Middle East were also constantly on the edge of rebellion, making taxation difficult and legion progression even harder. Expanding so quickly had added entire kingdoms of provinces that were straining the Scipii to its limits. Were Armenia to attack now, the entire Egyptian campaign would die a horrible death from which Gaius and the Scipii might not recover from.

So the situation came to be that, to the bewilderment of her allies, the Scipii continued to allow British diplomats in to try and come to an agreement. If only the British would take the trade deal and allow Carthage Nova to fall under Scipii control, the war both sides did not want or need could be averted.

And yet, every time, the British continued to astonish the increasingly desperate Romans with their arrogance and condescension, even as their king-less empire was torn in half by invaders. As Spain came into view and the legions prepared for an assault, Gaius and his advisors looked at the map in near despair, wondering what was to become of the world they were in and the glorious civilisation they had constructed?

It seemed more and more like the future of their children and their children's children was not dependant on the courage of men nor the strength of their walls but the balances in their books and the trade crossing the seas.

And then, a few sea traders began to turn ill...


	11. The Egyptians Strike Back

Whilst the first sieges in southern Spain progressed quickly and without any casualties amongst the Scipii, due to the British military's determination that the Julii would expand no further into Gaul, the sickness that had appeared in North Africa was beginning to worry the cities in the region. Carthage and Thaspus had not seen an outbreak as of yet but all the outlying villages had succumbed in some fashion. The disease or 'plague' would go on to ravage mainland Italy and reach as far as Macedonia before mysteriously disappearing.

Gaius and his newly matured son Numerius (the Great) met in Sicily to determine the campaign strategy for long term Scipii goals. Numerius wanted to more closely bind the Republic and the Scipii together, since as 75% of both the territory and the riches were coming from them. Gaius was now outright ignoring many of the Senate's decrees as it suited him, causing both adoration from his own and Rome's people but ire from the politicians in the Senate. By now though, the writing was on the wall for the more intelligent men in Rome, who could see that the S.P.Q.R did not hold a candle to the bright torches of the Julii, nor the majesty of the Brutii, and could hardly be compared to the Scipii at all.

With all three families far more powerful and widespread than the Republic that supposedly ruled over them, Gaius wanted to unite the three houses together and rule as one. The two men argued for many hours untill agreeing that Numerius should go to Capua as the new governor, to not only court the Senate but also the other families into the fold from their capital cities. At the time, the Julii were alternating between being the strongest faction with the Scipii, and the Brutii were alternating between most wealthy. Together, these three could crush any opposition, including (an taboo name or aim, even behind closed doors) the Republic itself, if necessary.

Gaius himself was ageing and growing to be 55 at the end of the campaigning season. His 'representatives of the Republic' (what he considered and what indeed was his own family's private empire) was the greatest and most powerful force on the Earth, a true testament to his ancestors, his father and brother, and himself. With the capture of Southern Iberia, there was nowhere left in the known world that now did not know the might of the Scipii (save for perhaps that mysterious homeland of the Britons) and her allies. After accomplishing the task of finally balancing the economy and watching it reach twenty year highs, Gaius allowed himself a break to Capri off the coast of Italy.

Unfortunately, a great and powerful threat was bearing down upon the Eastern front. Recent captures had led to the Asia Minor cities Scipii possessed being almost linked to the captured territory from the Middle Eastern front. The Pharaoh, still infuriating the Romans by evading capture or even sightings (for all they knew, there could have been three new rulers and they would not know) sent out every single army left under his command to destabilise the Eastern front and to reclaim cities from the First and Second legions.

Marching straight past the besieged Egyptian cities the two legions were fighting over, three veteran armies of the Pontic wars attacked Jerusalem and Antioch. The First legion captured the last remaining city within Scipii controlled territory and then sent a call to the Second legion for them to aid the defence of their provinces.

The legendary Second legion performed three battles in less than a week, obliterating all three of the greatest armies in the Middle East effortlessly before returning to their liberated new city and garrisoning it.

The shock and subsequent laughter emanating from Capri when Gaius received reports on these matters could apparently be heard from the messenger's ship far below the tall cliffs where he was staying. This latest victory once again proved the superiority of Roman tactics and soldiers over anything the Egyptians had, even their best troops that had won them an empire of their own. Egypt now possessed only its conquests from Pontus, a cruel and bitter irony as to their fate, to repeat the same patten as their old foes.

Pontus was now reduced to a single city state that constantly irritated the Egyptian military and made scouting for Scipii troop movement impossible for them. Gaius had already given instruction to the legions that Pontus be spared if possible, but now all three legions were becoming indebted to and earning a respect for the brave little nation that didn't give up even as its leaders failed them.

With Egypt's latest strategy a failure, the Britsh Army nowhere in sight in Spain and the economy back on track, the Scipii became acclaimed in Rome to the point of worship. The Senate by this time (the half that wasn't controlled by them) became immensely jealous and suspicious of the great Empire, (yes, even _they_ called it what it was before the Scipii officially did) across the sea that 'should be' theirs. All future dealing would be jaded by this and it goes a long way to explaining what eventually happened between Rome and Numerius.

The British were in not nearly as bad a situation as the Egyptians were, but had now given up on defending their European empire and instead conspired to make the Julii pay for every step they took further into Gaul. In Spain, they deliberately destroyed most of their records and maps so that the invading Scipii would not find their homeland or know their troop strength within. Finally, the entirety of their navy deployed just beyond the coast of Gaul, with the ill-gotten wealth and at least half of their military protected in the lands beyond. The Britons were no longer a player in Europe but that did not stop the race between the Julii and Scipii from escalating as each sought to claim half the prize for themselves.

As for the ever present ally Macedon, her war with Scythia was over, leaving the former fairly large Kingdom a mere two provinces situated north of the Caspian Sea. Now Macedonian rule stretched from the chilly northern wastelands to the rocky shores of Greece. The Brutii, ever the paranoid, demanded the Scipii to 'rein in' her ally, as the Macedonians were beginning to outstrip the green-hued Romans in population and in economic might, despite the Brutii now possessing the largest military force in the world (and having it almost solely deployed along the Macedonian/Brutii border).

Gaius, fed up with the demands from the other faction, essentially wrote up and consigned a treaty to the effect that the Scipii would stand against any who would attack one of their allies. This had the three other major powers in a frenzy, as all three were allied with and practically bound to the Scipii. If any attacked the other, the instigator would lose by proxy, as the Scipii's unbeatable legions swept them from history.

This only partially mended the growing waves of war among the Europeans, but it was hoped that it would prevent a conflict for many years to come and crucially, for the Scipii, would now only come when they wished it to. As Gaius concentrated back onto conquering Spain and the last three Egyptian cities, jealous eyes began to plot against the lesser powers in the world, and take what they believed to be rightfully theirs.

That fateful decision sparked a war in Europe that spanned the whole continent, destroyed a crucial alliance between two peoples and altered the balance of power so significantly that the fate of the Republic was sealed forever.

For in the year 176BC, Macedon invaded Italy.


	12. The Brutii-Macedonian War

The exact cause of this conflict were unknown at the time, although many now theorise that the ending of the war with Scythia, which culminated in Scythia retaining only her northern territories around the Caspian sea (the mountains to the west of its shores marked the border between them and Armenia), had led to most of the Greek forces being free for other purposes. The main desire for the Kings of Macedon now was the retrieval of the lost territories in Greece which they had forfeited to the Brutii in the beginning of both their faction's expansions.

Over a hundred years ago, as the disunited City States fought hard against both invaders, the Brutii gained Thermon and Apollnia, as well as the West Bank that gave them a land route back into Italy, whilst the Macedonians took everything else before expanding to the northeast with a mind to build an empire of her own.

That border was now the most heavily fortified on God's Earth and an influx of Macedonian troops that would effectively double their presence in Greece was unacceptable to the Romans, whom already had the world's largest army merely to maintain the large pan-European border with Macedon, which stretched from the fierce northern seas to the Mediterranean.

Knowing the reaction the Brutii were likely to have, the Macedonian's planned to destroy their long time competitor by destroying the economy that was paying for so many troops before crushing them in both Greece and Dacia. To that end, every port was simultaneously blockaded in the Mediterranean that belonged to the Brutii (admittedly, there were not that many to blockade).

Astonished that anyone could attack the Romans at sea where the Scipii reigned supreme, the Brutii faction leader ordered the Greek Border Legion to sally forward and attack the Macedonians, and he himself sent a letter to both the Senate and the Scipii reporting on the attack.

Gaius confusedly wrote back that their fleets had seen a mere handful of Macedonian ships travel along the Greek coast and they certainly had no knowledge of any attack on the Brutii. Later in front of the outraged Senate, Numerius quickly silenced the half of the room not belonging to his own faction by saying that this was clearly another ploy of the Macedonians. Knowing the breadth of their enemies and their military power, the Macedonians wished to weaken the Romans by igniting a civil war between the two families, which would have certainly sent the Julii into war as well.

Humbled by his words, the Senate ordered them to break off their alliance and cease trade. The Brutii would handle the military campaign. It was up to the Julii to conquer Gaul to free up their own troops to defend Rome, and up to the Scipii to conquer Spain and then find the British Imperium's homeland and take it from them.

Numerius and Manius, the leader of the Julii, spoke in confidence after the assembly. Manius took heed of the advice of the Scipii and sent forth a legion of his own to reside within Rome and police its streets. The Senate was getting fairly heavy handed as of late with the populace and refusing any more than half the seats in the house to the Scipii, against popular opinion. Manius then bluntly asked what it was that Gaius _wanted_ with Rome. Numerius answered honestly that he didn't know, but what _he_ wanted was for Rome to remain a strong and powerful city, regardless of who ran it.

Meanwhile, the conquest of Spain had gone swimmingly for the Romans, leaving only the central region and the heavily defended northernmost region (assailable only down a large valley between mountains) left to take from the British. The Scipii had noted with interest that apparently several faction heirs had been left behind, seemingly to die with honour with large armies, than taken back to safety. This made them, and by extension Gaius, wonder how much of the stall and subsequent fall of their empire had to do with the power struggle left behind after Theodric's death. Something to bear in mind should Numerius ever die without a clear heir.

The Brutii responded to the Macedonian's treachery by instigating a deep and penetrating attack on their city of Thessalonica. If they lost that city, their remaining land routes to Greece would be severed and the Brutii could conquer the whole area with greater ease. There was also a surprise invasion by the Julii northern territories whom, having been assured that their southern brothers were destroying the British, invaded the former Scythian lands at Domus Dulcis Domus, introducing the possibility that the Macedonains might be encircled by a joint Roman force. If the Scipii were to attack now (having remained decidedly neutral up to this point) from the sea and destoryed their Black Sea fleet? It would be the end of yet another great power, with again surprising ease.

The Armenian king however prevented the Scipii from going on with the plan. Whilst his power was laughable compared to the Scipii as a whole, right now he had his invincible army of warriors poised over the volatile cities of the West Bank with the First and Second Legions further north attacking the last two Egyptian cities. Gaius could not afford an attack on Macedon only to be attacked by both a revenge army and also the Armenian one.

It was clear however that the Macedonains, like so many great empires before them, had failed to comprehend the true power of the Romans. It remained to be seen as to whether they could fight back against the invading forces or hold onto their status and land, but unifying the Romans (even if it was only briefly) was a _terrible_ mistake that sifted the balance of power right into their enemies hands.

The fall of Spain followed shortly after, with many celebrations in Africa and in Asia, and with fear and dread in Europe. The British felt despair as their mighty empire began to shatter around them. The Macedonians despaired as their former ally grew even more widespread and powerful.

And the other Romans? They too were uneasy. The Scipii were calling Spain 'their presence' in Europe, just as they had once described their first Numidian conquests and Cyprus, before the dominant power in that region fell before them. The Julii and the Brutii both watched with no small amount of trepidation as the third great family of Rome became ever more their superior. The Senate itself was diminished as the ones they had thought of (and treated as) so long of as their servants had become a completely unchallenged empire that spanned from the tips of the Iberian Peninsula to the Far Eastern deserts.

Not one of the powers in Europe could shake the feeling that perhaps, they were next.


	13. A Moment of Crisis

The conquest of Spain completed the first of the Senate's campaign objectives for the Scipii. Now they wished for the naval powerhouse to blockade Athens and perhaps a few more Macedonian cities in the Greek heartlands, as several weeks before Brutuis Brutii had successfully captured Thessalonica, trapping the Greeks and cutting off the Macedonian Empire from its headquarters.

Should the Scipii prove able to seize any relief forces or supplies coming from the Black Sea, the whole peninsula would fall to the Brutii assault.

Gaius and his admirals were unwilling to do this, not for their old alliance with Macedon (which had been broken off years before) but for two very strategic reasons. First, the war with the Egyptians was coming to a close. The entirety of their empire had fallen and their last city, Sinope, had just been assaulted by the Second Legion. There was no desire for a new war in the east with the Aremnians or the Pontics, both of whom had close (and in the Pontic's case, personal) relations with Macedon.

The second reason was that even though Brutius was an able commander of men, his brothers in the north had failed in their efforts to destroy the Macedonian Victory Army from Scythia, even with reinforcements from the Julii aiding them. The war in the north of their empire might yet save the Macedonians in the south, where their fortifications were heaviest and best equipped for long sieges.

So the Scipii delayed, with ships ready to cross the Adriatic with all haste towards Greece, but with the naval commanders and Gaius II himself still undecided as to whether or not they wished to declare war on Macedon. Ignoring the Senate and refusing to fight with their Roman comrades essentially meant declaring their independence and sovereignty from the Senate, something Rome would never allow to stand without a fight.

Gaius therefore looked for a compromise. Sinope had just fallen and the Scipii were at peace with all but the British...and here his mind began to scheme. For Rome was only as great as the people who followed her, and if the Scipii could court the Julii into their camp...

The Julii were delighted to receive word of more support from their Scipii brothers and both factions began a renewed assault on Gaul, with the eventual plan to leave Julii most of the Gallic country and the Scipii with whatever homeland the British had retreated too. The famed red legions of Rome had ever been the Republic's staunchest defenders, never ceasing in their quest to defend Italy even when the Gauls and the British had destroyed their armies and moved through the Alps. Now, as both Rome's official police force with an army garrisoned outside the gates for protection, a heavily fortified frontier in the Alps and expansion projects unever way across the Rhine and into Gaul, the Julii were finally fulfilling their destiny as the true defenders of the People.

The Brutii and Scipii would never see eye to eye and both understood that if it came to pass that the two powers ever shared a border, even in the eastern provinces, a war was inevitable. Hence why Brutius and Numerius both argued with their leaders to begin viewing the other faction as a rival no longer but now a threat.

In the middle of all of this, the Senators were debating once again. The Scipii had recently paid and installed their half of the Senate in a grand and luxurious mansion that doubled as an impenetrable fortress within Rome. This irked the Brutii and independents but nowhere near as much as the news that Scipii Urban Cohorts were guarding the citadel instead of SPQR soldiers or Julii enforcers. Numerius, seeing the writing on the wall (and knowing no one could really stop him), refused point blank to remove the troops and began massing a secret army in Capua to the south. If the Senate would dare to move against the will of the people's electives, they would be stopped by Roman iron.

This was unknown to Gaius, who was personally on his way to Asia to hunt down the remaining members of the Egyptian monarchy, that had somehow escaped the sack of their last city and even managed to take the second to last city of the Pontics. With his father gone and out of contact for months, Numerius began ramping up the development of the Spainish lands and building new armies in Carthage and in Sicily. He would not presume to begin a war without Gaius, but he would be ready for the one that had been brewing for his entire lifetime.

Numerius was forced however, to make one critical decision. The Brutii had crushed a Macedonian army and had pushed the Greeks all the way back to Athens in the south and Byzantium in the east. Having determined the Macedonians would indeed lose the war with Rome, the Scipii sent forward their ships, casting the die yet again and bringing war to their old friends.

It would not be the last time they were put into that situation.


	14. The Falling Pieces

The Brutii had completely obliterated the Macedonian front line before Gaius had made it to Asia to destroy Egypt. Numerius' decision had saved the Scipii from an embarrassment in front of all the other Romans and secured the Republic from a civil war...for now (a phrase that can be applied often for the next few years of Roman history).

The Spanish campaign armies were resupplying in Carthage before the two legions would sail back to Gaul (or perhaps further afield).

The Macedonians had been reduced in an extremely hasty fashion from a grand empire to their holdings in Southern Greece, the city of Byzantium and their five northern-most territories. The Scipii had demolished their fleets, the Brutii had destroyed their armies and the heirs to Alexander were staring defeat in the face. This time though, there was no way the Brutii were taking a peace treaty with them. Their only hope of keeping up with the Scipii was to conquer the Macedonians and the Scythians, and even then, if the Julii decided to stay neutral, they would lose a civil war, an outcome that was looking increasingly more likely as the Scipii returned their attention to Europe.

Numerius, now in effective command over the expansive Scipii holdings whilst Gaius was away, foresaw the eventuality and took steps to counterbalance it. With his father approaching 61 and riding into battle once more, it was quietly assumed by both himself and everyone else that this would be the beginnings of his tenure as family and faction leader. Fortunately for the Scipii, the Scipio line was secure once more, as both Numerius and his distant cousin Decimus [_yes, __really_] had heirs to carry on the family name.

The Egyptian's last stand beckoned to the ageing Gaius like a flame to a moth. Here at last was the Pharaoh, the god-king that once ruled the desert. Here was the slayer of his long dead brother Tiberius. Mazaka would be his grave, along with his civilisation's tomb. Their pyramids had been viewed with awe by the First and Second legions, their walls were thick and mighty, their ports rich with gold and trade. But the people were _weak_. The nobles were cowardly. The Egyptians were not fit to rule, and thus the Scipii had removed them by the grace of their gods.

The heroic Second legion marched with their commander and father towards their final battle against the Egyptians with a song in their hearts, whilst the First legion vigilantly watched the Armenian border for any sign of trickery from the near-mythical king and his invincible army.

Instead of the cowardly Pharaoh hiding inside of his last refuge, he suprised all by riding out with his entire army to meet with the Romans in a pitch battle one last time. His army outnumbered the Romans twice over, and his onagers commanded a huge hill defended by spear troops. Gaius saw that this was going to be the greatest and hardest battle of the entire war, fittingly enough, for it was also the last.

Gaius charged his five companion sections of horsemen along and up the flanks, tricking the Egyptians into losing their onagers and then killing 30% of their troops before his main army was even in position at a hill of their own.

Then it became closer to 40%.

Inevitably, they were surrounded by archers and the Egyptian heavy cavalry, but Gaius was not dismayed and fought out of the ring encircling him before routing even more troops.

Suddenly, the Egytpian army broke and made to run back to the city in surrender, having slain a mere ninety men to the Roman's tally of over five hundred in the first few minutes of battle. They never made it, as they ran straight into the waiting archers and were cut down to a man by both arrow and mounted attacks.

If there was ever an example of why their empire had fallen it was here. Five horse units of thirty men each had _obliterated_ over half of a combined two army coalition led by royalty. Led no longer, it seemed, for in the centre of the pile of bodies, the cause of the rout was clear. The pharaoh and all fifty of his elite house guards lay dead, surrounding the body of Gaius, his face in a delighted yet peaceful expression in death, satisfied that vengeance and justice had been done.

The collapse of Macedon's relief force in the north, the fall of the last Egyptian city with not one voice amongst the populace raised in protest and more importantly, the loss of the great Gaius Scipio the Second, who had truly been the empire building man the histories speak of, had shown to the surviving powers of the world that they were at the beginning of the end for their Age and that soon, a new one would have to begin.


	15. The Roman Question

Numerius was saddened greatly by the news of his father's demise. His conformation however, would set the tone for all future leaders of Rome and her empires. Wreathed in gold and deep sea blue, he was crowned head of the most powerful family in the world to an adoring Roman public, many happy family relations and the cheering armies that had sailed from Egypt to Capua and then onto Rome for his initiation.

The Senate was split of course. The two Julii office holders and the independent, but ironically named Lucius Scipio (yes, descendent from a brother of Cornelius who had stayed in Rome) were with the half of the senate under the banner of the Scipii in applauding the new ruler. Consul Fannius [_yes, really_]and the Pontifex Maximus were less impressed, as were the Brutii family in general, who were just about fed up of the 'oh so glorious' Scipii, their widely variant economy and their miserable successes everywhere they happened to go. This was to be the last public meeting of the four pillars of the Republic before the event that essentially tore all but one of them down forever.

Numerius surprisingly decided to go on campaign himself and left with the restored legions to Iberia, the new name of the collection of provinces that had at one time belonged to the spaniards. Almost the entirety of Gaul was not only unmapped and unobserved but remained fiercely defended by the British, despite their main armies having long gone back to their homeland. Still, there were three huge armies holding the line against the Julii advance in the south, whilst the northern war had sputtered out as the Julii had sent their forces there over to the eastern front to fight Macedon.

In more shocking news, the scouting flotilla sent by the Scipii admirals was utterly destroyed by an almighty armada of battleships in the channel between Gaul and the islands they were scouting. It was clear that those were, if not the homelands, very dear to the British, and must be taken if the war in Gaul was to be won. The size and power of the navy scared Numerius for the first time in years, as his faction now wasn't the only true power on the water, even if it was a whole other sea away. The invasion of those lands would be extremely difficult, and only the most talented commanders could hope to come through successfully. It was no surprise then, that Numerius himself was fighting in Gaul rather than attack the British in their homeland. For the moment, they were safe there.

Pontus had outlasted their Egyptian rivals for a mere few months before finally dying their long foretold death to rebellion from the inside of the city. Now all the empires of the east were gone, and with Macedon crumbling, it seemed Alexander's world was truly about to disappear forever. Ironically, the Client Kingdom that had served so many powers in the region now controlled about half of it, most of the Caspian Sea and the mountain entrances into the Steppes. Armenia was a problem for Numerius to be sure, and the First legion was poised to fling Rome's might at the only remaining original inhabitants of these lands should they receive any funny ideas about expansion from the blind old men they called sages.

The problems for the Scipii navy however, were far from over. Smelling blood in the water and weakness for the first time in years, a group of pirates dared to attack a Scipii escort (one containing a new governor no less!), with the British themselves managing to place a fleet of their own inside the Mediterranean Sea. This would not stand and the admirals fought back with devastating consequences. All ships they could find from the Egyptian campaign were flung into the Western Mediterranean and obliterated the enemy vessels, before beginning a long sail around Iberia for their confrontation with the upstarts in the water themselves in the British controlled channel.

The plague was coming to an end in the East, having spread through Africa and affected a few cities here and there throughout the expansive provinces of the Scipii. They were of little concern for actual city dwellers (by this time, all Roman cities were being systematically upgraded to be as publicly hygienic and clean as possible, the streets were widened and building houses from wood were banned inside city walls).

This created a population boom so massive that the Scipii now had _more_ citizens than the rest of the Republic, the Macedonians (and according to modern reckoning, the British too) combined. Coupled with a meritocracy, a completely competent civil service and a massive treasury, the Scipii were now fully capable of killing and conquering the entire known world had they wished too. The fact that Numerius did not immediately march on Rome, even though the people called him a _god_ and his armies seemingly outnumbered the entrenched and battered Brutii forces, stands to show, despite everything, that the Scipii had a respect for the Republic and the personal wisdom to know that they had no real right to rule in Rome.

That decision though, even as it preserved the Senate, doomed the Republic. The greatest and most powerful people in the world had deemed the Italian peninsula unworthy of their attention...and they were right. That, more than anything else, stopped the Brutii and the Senate from pushing the Scipii any more. Knowing for a fact that their supposed enemy could defeat them so easily that they didn't even send any threats was enough.

The Julii however, were getting sick and tired of the manipulative and conniving Senators in their grand palaces and the arrogance of the Brutii in their lands, even as both fought in Macedon and beyond. Only the Scipii had ever truly aided them and shown them respect, and with their attention elsewhere and the Gallic war more of a stalemate than anything else, the Julii family began, for the first time in their history, to plot against the Senate. Their aim, to restore the Republic and diminish the Brutii, was nothing short of genius and for a time, even the Scipii looked on in wonder as one of the greatest power grabs in history occurred right under their noses.


	16. The Invasion of Greece

The Second legion had finished repairing all battle damage and had secured the last city of the Egyptians. It was currently fighting with the Third legion (sent from Scilly) to restore order to the former Pontus stronghold (Pontus had finally fallen to rebellion after Egypt had been destroyed).

An golden opportunity had occurred that the generals wanted to take advantage of. The Brutii had yet to enter the Greek peninsula, despite destroying the Macedonian armies sent from their southern lands, and so should the Scipii cross the sea and take Athens, Corinth and Sparta first, they would not only silence the Senate doubters about not helping in the war but also have another base in mainland Europe with a single narrow border to defend against their Brutii 'allies'.

Thus, ships were preparing in Pergamum, blockades had increased in intensity around the cities and the two legions were ready to march along the coast to reach the port that would take them over the Greece. Meanwhile, the Fourth legion that had just finished being recruited was sailed in from Sicily, and they alighted just outside of Corinth, just as the Brutii were laying siege to Athens, greatest city of the Greeks (and one of the great cities of the world).

Trouble was brewing in the Far East yet again, as the Aremnian king was not amused when the Scipii 'purchased' his city of Kotais, giving them his only sea port and a monopoly on Eastern and African resources, and trade on the Mediterranean. When his heir arrived back in the capital however, his angry father quickly quietend when he saw the 20,000 gold coins the Romans had paid, plus advice from his son to accept another deal of theirs for an extra 30,000 in order to get the other border town, which would give the Scipii control over the Scythian border and access through the mountains to the Caspian sea itself.

The king was unwilling but his crafty heir then said that his spies were ready to pull a coup in the newly purchased town and that his armies were ready to invade and take advantage of the fact that the Third legion had left for Greece (though they of course did not know why). When the coup attempt succeeded, the Senate angrily told the Scipii to get it back at all costs, the Armenians said they had to respect their former citizens rights and both sides went to war.

Unfortunately for the son, he had forgotten about the First legion that was patrolling the border in the Middle East. As soon as war began, the southern-most city in the kingdom was placed under siege by an army double his in size and a whole Kingdom away from his position. Armenia had, like so many others, failed to understand the capacity for warfare the Scipii possessed.

In Gaul, negotiations were underway between the Julii and Scipii as to what would become of the rapidly declining British territory. Since it had become apparent that the region would be better unified into one province, the two factions began discussing who should be the one who would control it, or rather, _could_ the Julii feasibly run the whole country effectively when the Scipii legions left. Their whole family history had spent the last hundred years defending Italy against all aggressors and their whole society and economy was designed for massive troop recruitments, fortification payments and being Rome's guard.

However, handing over the whole conquered territory would directly violate the Senate directive (_Rome Concord 672: Scipii shall have Iberia, Julii shall have Gaul_) and greatly anger the Brutii, whom would (should the deal go on) finally share a direct land border with the Scipii, which both factions wished to avoid at all costs. Even the Scipii's invasion of Greece was allowed only because (should all go well) there would only be the very narrow passage between the mountains and the sea to patrol.

Both the Scippi and the Julii were understandably extremely cautious about any agreements they might make, as both knew that, this time, the stakes were not just how much value either side though they could get out of Gaul, but whether or not the Republic would be at war with itself. The negotiations ground to a halt when the diplomats and Numerius himself heard of the Brutii siege of Athens. The act not only jeopardised the Scipii battle plan but was viewed as an act of defiance and pettiness on the Brutii's part, having know about Numerius' ambitions in the area. Even the Senate was astonished at the Brutii stratagem, as deliberately antagonising the Scipii military whilst they had an legion within marching distance and many more prepped to voyage towards the region was seen as warmongering and foolish.

The situation in Greece only heightened the awareness throughout the Republic that its time was coming to an end. The three main Roman families were simply too powerful for the Senate now.

In Africa, the Scipii had built a land of milk and honey, where even the poorest dwelling had peace, security and bread on the table. In the East, massive construction projects (necessitated when the news broke among the garrisons that the Egyptians had killed Gaius, which they did _not take well_) had Romanised much of the former Greek/Egyptian men, and the studies of the natural world continued anew in Alexandria and across the Middle East. In Iberia, the same projects were starting up, thus employing the local populace and inspiring new enterprise, along with a strong work ethic. All seven wonders of the world wore deep ocean blue flags now and it was plain to all that the Scipii were held much in favour by their gods.

The Brutii had also gone from strength to strength, utilising their determination (and humongous armies) to 'liberate' the entire central Macedonian Empire, including the great city of Byzantium, and had thus entered a population, economic and social boom the Scipii had experienced many years before in Africa. The fact they had no navy whatsoever only shows how ingrained the idea of Roman cooperation was even in those troubled times. The Scipii still provided transport and trade protection, even for the Senate's trade fleets (though this was infamously the most 'examined and fined' trade fleet in the world at the time) but the possibility of a Brutii navy on the Black Sea caused no end of concerns for the Scipii Admiralty, whom had long had a monopoly on the water, originating one hundred years ago. Brutuis had proven himself the better of his forebears, doing what even Gaius had not done: built his empire basically by himself. When he was placed in the running for consul at the end of the year, _no one_ stood against him.

The Julii were an interesting oddity among the Romans. They had never shirked in their duty to the Senate or the people (and were loved by both equally) and had kept their ambitions purely centred in improving their home cities and building effective defence forces for Rome itself and their own provinces. This meant that there was a military comparable in size to the Scipii's defending a very small, extremely fortified northern Italy border, a legion next to Rome (with a peacekeeping garrison inside as well) and an expeditionary force tearing apart the British before they became a threat again. In truth, the Scipii did not want the Julii to keep all of Gaul because they did not want yet _another_ European empire developing (that was much better led than the other three that came before) that also held so much sway in Italy.

Their power only grew when certain Brutii senators began to disappear in Rome, some managing to find their way into rivers, bottomless gorges and gladiator pits. The Julii pounced on the 'unfortunate' loss of the senators and their membership grew to a full quarter of the Senate and all of the high offices. With an army and a police force 'keeping the peace' and the other two factions convinced that the other side killed the men to frame them, the Julii had ensured that the Senate was mostly dancing to their tune from now on, though both other factions maintained larger presences of politicians in Rome than they did. Were the Julii armies able to conquer Gaul now, they had the personal aid of the Senate to help them manage the place, making the Scipii deal (for the moment) irrelevant.

It is said that when Numerius and his advisors actually figured out that this was all the Julii's fault, they all froze in their seats and then began laughing. If the Julii could keep up their personal protection of Rome, and the Scipii could find a way of removing the Brutii from Southern Italy, their old competitors would find themselves with their armies a long way from the Republic's centre with no representatives of importance in the Senate (apart from Brutuis, and he was the consul assigned to expanding the Republic and would in fact rarely set foot in Rome again) and no settlements. The only thing that stood in the way of this new idea was the two governers of the southern cities and exactly how _much_ gold they would need to sell out their families.

The state of the world being what it was, the Macedonians and the Aremnians became little more than annoyances for the two main powers, as they held up vital troops in restoring order to recently captured cities (in the Brutii's case) and the stretches of land involved in the Armenian expanse spanned the entire length of the former Egyptian empire and the roads were of poorer quality (or none existent). The Armenians might have miscalculated in their dealings with Rome, but their kingdom's relative poverty, desert wastelands and unruly citizens might yet make the Scipii force them to the diplomatic table instead of burying them under unmarked graves.

Numerius and the other Roman leaders had a right to be proud as the spring blossoms came and went. The Republic had, between all of them, crushed everyone in their way and was the master in Europe, Africa and Asia. However, despite the Julii and Brutii assaults, the British Imperium (technically) still existed, the Macedonians looked ready to fight to the death, the Armenians still controlled their entire kingdom and posed an army that had never been beaten AND the central government of the Republic was incapable of controlling any of her great families anymore.

Numerius and his advisors were also concerned about Egypt. It was once a great power, having destroyed the Seleucids, the Parthians, the Pontics, and successfully fought off Macedon and intimidated the Armenians. Yet they were now gone. And in such short a time too. Was their fate to be the same. Would they one day make a mistake and attack a greater power or even be supplanted by a lesser one?

Just who would _win_ a Roman Civil War, and what would the world look like when it was all over?


	17. A tragedy

Numerius' own campaign in Gaul had finally gained some momentum, crushing the British armies at the river crossing into Iberia and then again on the western coast. His army now rested in the only settlement in the area, whilst the engineers all Roman armies traveled with were busily reconstructing the fishing port to connect to the trade networks.

Corinth had also fallen, and now the path to Sparta, the warrior people, was laid bare. With the Brutii (fortunately) still busy laying siege to Athens, the Scipii descended on the southern tips of Greece, hoping that they could conquer all of it, as their islands of Rhodes and Crete nearby would be greatly complimented with a mainland near them to trade with that was not the wrecked and burned former Egyptian Empire.

The Julii and Scipii controlled Senate was eager to reinstate the former campaign against the Briton's homeland, whilst Brutuis merely wanted Numerius gone from civilization for a while, and so sent word to him to head up the west coast towards the channel that would bear him hence. The Julii settled on the strategy of expanding from Italy upwards through eastern Gaul to compliment their own holdings, trusting the Scipii to deal with most of the larger and better defended towns in the west.

Whilst Nuemrius was away in Gaul and the Julii leader was in Rome sorting the Senate out, Brutuis had come into his own as the new faction leader of the Brutii. It was his skill and ability that had expanded his family's holdings so much over the past few years, and now he was presented with another challenge: how to deal with a rouge Roman faction? The Scipii had clearly corrupted (to an extent) the Julii and murdered half the Senate in a power grab the likes of which they had never seen (at this point, the Brutii still hadn't figured out it was the Julii who caused this to happen). Their audacity was matched only by their success, and the Brutii now had only independents that were sympathetic towards them, some holdings in southern Italy, and the general respect of the Roman people, along with Brutuis' moral obligation to expand the Republic with his title of consul, the office of which ran out in a few years.

It was a budding disaster of epic proportions, and Brutuis knew he had to resolve this as soon as possible. At the moment, he was leading his forces against Athens, but word had reached him of one, then a second and now a rumoured _third_ legion descending upon Southern Greece, _his rightful lands_, to take for the Scipii's greedy hands.

Brutuis was not a foolish man. No one had ever won a land battle against the Scipii and their navy had only lost a total of fifteen incidents to pirates, the British Imperial Navy and the Egyptian Armada. The fact that these Roman vessels were outnumbered ten to one and were mostly scout craft also played on his mind. Short of a miracle, he could not win a war against the Scipii, they were just too great a power. Whatever chance anyone had was lost when they crossed the sea and took Carthage. They then took North Africa with such ease that no one seriously opposed them, and by the time they bordered a credible power (Egypt) they had an untameable section of the world ruled by them.

No...the Julii must be brought in line with Brutii thinking, and then the Scipio family must die. Only then might their empire collapse around them, as Alexander's did. Still, that plan seemed impossible, and Brutuis tried desperately to think of another way. His own empire (the collective might of the Brutii and former Macedonian holdings) contained ancient and large cities, packed with the most well trained and abundant military forces in the world. It was also denser than the Scipii sprawl, so should Numerius decide to attack, he would have to fight an entire Brutii army, and then their neighbouring city garrison, and then a reinforcing army, and then another, all within days. For now then, his faction was safe. But the Scipii had no real threats left to their power, and the Brutii honestly did not have the economy nor the population to fight a war of attrition (which if the Scipii campaigned smartly, would be precisely what would happen).

Athens glittered like a jewel in the distance. He was within days of having it. And yet, it was all too bittersweet. Another would be the one to expand Athens, the first city of civilisation. Another would command the seas, write the histories and rule the world.

Another...

Just because they were far too strong for anyone, or even _everyone_ else now to stand against them. When Armenia fell, and it would fall, Macedon, Scythia, the Britons and the Republic would be the only people's left on the map.

Within fifty years, Brutuis thought sadly, there would probably be only one.


	18. The Gathering Storm

The Scipii continued to expand and conquer in their methodical and meticulous way, making short work of all British resistance until they reached the northern coast of Gaul.

Behind them lay only Scipii territory. To the east, there were still sizeable British armies and towns before the Julii and Brutii northern territories. Across the waters, Numerius could see the unmistakable rise of new land, with cliffs of startling white beaming the sun's rays back at the legion on the shoreline. The scouting fleet had finally made it back after being batters by winds, the Brikishi Imperial Navy and pirates. They reported on a large island, surrounded by treacherous rocks and ships, filled to the brim with warriors and woodlands. Numerius, both pleased and concerned by what he had learnt about the age old enemy, began composing an invasion fleet and organising the provinces captured by their army whilst making it to this point.

Meanwhile, the Armenian reputation for warfare was met and proven. Their phalanx was nothing new for the First legion, but their horse archers were a nightmarish blend of armour and missile. Combining that with the walls of spears and the Armenian heavy missile launchers, and it was clear why the unarmored and fairly small army make ups of the Pontics and the Parthians struggled to ever even cross swords with these people. The Romans however not only had superior numbers and better armour and training, but also the gold to bribe mercenaries into giving up their weapons to be examined.

Taking all of this information, the Scipii decided to ignore the phalanx spears whilst their superior (and faster) cavalry destroyed or at least distracted the horse archers and other supporting units. In this fashion, the Armenians soon learnt fear where there had been no reason to before, and quickly lost three armies to a man before the First legion's swords.

The Macedonians had recently lost Athens, along with the rest of Greece to a Brutii and Scipii assault. Now they had only two territories left, ironically enough, the same amount as the Scythians, their old enemy. Even more awkwardly for the remaining two kingdoms, their territories were next to each other, and they were both being encircled by the approaching Brutii armies.

Interestingly enough, the Brutii were also technically surrounded themselves. To the north of their empire was the Julii northern territories, whilst in the west were the main Julii cities. Southern Greece belonged to the Scipii, and should they choose to cross the mountains and attack Scythia, the Scipii would block them in the East too. Still, Brutuis' military was now by far the largest in the world, with every settlement seemingly having an army to defend it. Combined with the wealth and age of their cities, the Brutii empire was becoming a powerful force in its own right again, no longer held back after all of its ties to the Senate were forcibly cut by Julii assassin blades.

The Senate had, since its purge by 'acts of gods' had seen to fit to reinstate the Scipii into office once again, thought the Julii (unsurprisingly) maintained the censor, domestic consul and religious roles. With the two families growing ever closer politically, Numerius decided to help them out militarily too. The British Imperial Navy had been a constant pain for both factions but the Julii had borne the worst of it. Unprotected by a fleet of their own, their ports were constantly under bombardment, their lands were often accosted by sea raiders and the reinforcements from the other side of the channel were more than enough to halt their march north. So when the admiralty reported that the Scipii fleet had caught the navy just coming out of the gulf that was fed by the mighty river their capital was built on, Numerius ordered them to engage.

The battle proved to be disastrous for the British, having lost half of their navy and all troops that were being transported with it. Worse still, their supporting navies and what remained of the main fleet had been blow into the far icier waters surrounding the Julii northern territories. With the Scipii giving chase, it was made all too clear to the British that their first line of defence had failed and that their homeland had to prepare for an invasion from the most successful fighting force ever assembled.

When the news broke in Rome, the revelry lasted more more than two weeks and the news that Macedon had been pushed back to its two cities had everyone from every family in celebration. Numerius had sent diplomats to the Julii to capitalise on this goodwill by planning to put in an offer for Narbo Martius, in the south of Gaul. He did not ask for any land east of that region, for he knew that was where the defences leading into Italy began and nothing on this earth would make the Julii give those up to another. However, he was confident they would accept the offer, considering his faction excelled in provincial management and home defence, whilst the Julii's duty was to defend the home and heartlands at all costs.

The Macedonian conflict was also on Numerius' mind. How could he possibly capitalise on this war further without being held accountable? The histories tell us that his answer once again lay with the sea. With the taking of Athens, there was a legion waiting with no standing orders in Greece that had no use there (the war for the moment was won there), so they were sailed across the Black Sea to Chersonesos, the Macedonian's now-capital, which controlled a tiny and strange little peninsula in that sea that the Scipii wished to prevent falling into Brutii hands. Should they capture it, the entire ocean from Iberia to Jersualam would effectively belong to the Scipii.

It also played a part in the grand plan Gaius II, Numerius' father, had dreamt up should the Brutii ever develop an empire of their own. The idea was that the Brutii would almost certainly have a large Central European empire. That meant the Scipii should endeavour to have as many cities on the outskirts of that empire as possible, to project not only their own influence but to build trade networks and friendships with the provinces next to theirs (and to steal trade from them). It also made sense militarily, as the Brutii would then face an enemy on many fronts at once whilst having as few ports as possible to build up a navy (both to compete with the Scipii's own ships and to transport troops around).

In that aim, the situation in Greece had gone almost perfectly to plan. Now if the Macedonian and Gaul borders were to be established, the Brutii would be hemmed in by the Scipii and prevented from operating in secret or independently of their knowledge.

Whilst the Scipii were under no threat and the wars (in Europe at least) were winding down, there was still room for uncertainty. The Armenian army was far from weak, even after a string of defeats. No word had been heard from the Scythians since the end of their war with Macedon (years ago now) and it was unclear to both the Brutii and the Scipii where their two empires would share borders, except in Greece. The fact that the world map had gone from many powers competing over vast amounts of land to two Roman factions arguing over tiny village populations made the people who were old enough to remember sixty years previously (mostly in Scipii-owned cities, due to their exceptional health care system), the world had certainly changed a great deal. The land was far safer, the people were happier, richer and more numerous, and Rome was the centre of a glorious Republic that spanned (in theory) the entirety of the known world.

It is unknown how many of them believed it would last.


	19. Breaking Point

The Julii were well pleased with the sucess they and the Scipii had found in Gaul and so the Senate backed an directive for the Scipii to begin their conquest of Britannia, the name assigned to the homeland of their ancient enemy.

That would have to wait however, as a surprise and deadly assault on Artaxarta in the captured Armenian lands had nearly led to a Scipii loss. Never before had an enemy gotten past the Scipii defences.

The Armenians made it to the centre of the city.

Never before had the Scipii lost a land battle anywhere in their empire.

The Armenians were repelled at a near total loss of everyone within the city, with only their own infantry receiving notable damage.

The Scipii aura of invincibility was whipped away. Had the Armenians won, the whole Middle East might have risen in rebellion against their relatively new masters. The man who had prevented the disaster, Claudius of Carthage, was knighted and adopted into the Scipii family. He would later become a consul of Rome (though by that point, that didn't mean much).

Cowed but undefeated, the First legion ploughed through the Armenian second army and took the Scipii's first city in the war. Another disaster struck the East however, when a massive earthquake began in the tiny channel between Byzantium and Asia Minor. This caused chaos along the coast and wrecked many a trading vessel. Thankfully, the Scipii fleets had long since sailed to more contested waters, leaving military damages minimal.

The near-defeat and Posiden's quake spread rumours around the Republic that the Scipii had fallen out of favour with the gods at last. No cities actually rebelled, but more rebel armies were appearing all of the time. The Brutii were delighted, and hoped this would delay any expansion plans in Gaul or against Macedon. Brutuis however was disquieted. A large and powerful army had failed to defeat a tiny garrison in a tiny village with a wooden fence around it. Just how could one defeat the Scipii? How could he defend his people from their greedy gaze?

These wonderings became even more pressing when news broke that Narbo Martius had been traded over to the Scipii. This so enraged the Brutii that they demanded the Senate that this would not stand. To underline their point, they sent the three legions they had keeping the peace in Greece to Rome itself, on a 'diplomatic mission'. The Senate very quickly sent demands of their own to the Scipii to give the settlement back...free of charge.

Both the Julii and the Scipii refused in disgust. This dealing had finally revealed for all to see how pitifully weak the Senate was. Even when half of their number followed the right of Roman law (the Scipii side), even when their leaders were wise Julii members, still they could not stand up for themselves, even in a colossal city guarded by their own legions and a Julii one. This arrangement over the tiny backwater had polarised the Republic so much that two families were now seriously considering drawing arms and forcing the Brutii to leave Rome's land. Such an act would guarantee a war, one which would almost certainly end with the destruction of one, if not all of the great houses.

The situation in the Macedoinan war didn't aid matters. Numerius' plan of gaining a foothold had succeeded, but the Brutii were besieging the last city of the enemy. Soon, their whole military would be free to turn west, whilst the Scipii were still fighting a difficult desert war against the Armenians, and both the Julii and the Scippi still in the process of conquering Gaul. Interestingly, the Senate tried to speed this process up by declaring peace throughout the Republic with the Macedonians.

Every faction ignored this ruling.

That, more than anything else, convinced everyone left with a brain in the Senate that their day was over and that they had to pick a side between the Brutii and the Scipii. What was worse for the was that the Scipii or the Julii would clearly win a war against the Brutii, in Italy at least. But there was a Brutii army outside their city NOW demanding their loyalty. The Scipii and their independent senate supporters retreated to the citadel across the river Tiber, thus ending the full session of the senate, the last one that body would ever hold as an independent entity.

None of the three families wanted a war. The Julii were dug in and numerous, their armies were all within supporting range of each other and they had the huge cities in Italy under their command. But they had no hope of winning a sustained conflict against either one of the two empires. The Brutii and the Scipii also didn't want or desire a war, knowing both the outcome and what the cost of that outcome would mean. Essentially, for the Scipii to win (which they _would_ if it came to it), at least half the population of the Republic would die and perhaps a million soldiers would be killed. If that did not set off massive rebellions outside of the Roman heartlands, the remaining empire would still have the huge problems of mass population deficits in the west, mass _over_-populations in the east and and a ruined central government.

A war was coming that no one wanted. It was the fault of all involved for forcing each to begin preparing. Most of all though, the Senate was blamed. Their weakness, petty rivalry and lack of dominance had created a Republic split into three with all sides hating each other. Whomever took Rome, and this was agreed in secret between all three families, whomever took the capital would immediately and without hesitation kill all the senators, raze the Senate buildings and prevent any escape.

Numerius was weary as the year came to a close. He was at war with three decaying powers, two of which were still putting up a monumental struggle in defiance of his forces. Soon his empire would be fighting the entire Roman world too. He had no illusions about the possibility of an alliance with the Julii (or even maintaining a peace with the Brutii). Such an act would merely delay what needed to be done to the next generation, something both Brutuis and Numerius both wished to avoid.

Both men would learn to regret their faction's apathy.


	20. Eve of War

Numerius soon resumed the northern sea conquests and took the rest of the British holdings on the coast. The fall of northern Gaul put an end to the British resistance's reinforcements from Britannia, yet fighting in the east remained fierce as the Julii struggled to reach the last two rebellious towns.

Numerius was positioning watchtowers along the coast when news broke that the diminished Senate had declared war on Macedon again and urged their fellow Romans to join the cause. It was such a blatant attempt at salvaging whatever dignity they had left that not even their own city would look their representatives in the face any more.

In more urgent reports, the Scipii and British fleets were still battling for dominance, with the British launching a surprise comeback that completely destroyed the fleet blockading the river flowing from their capital. It seemed that an invasion into their homeland would be harder than he or the Senate had imagined. In light of this, he disregarded the directive to take Londinium, the Roman designation for their trade capital (and the only city they were aware of), in favour of landing in a slightly smaller island off the coast of Britannia, which was untameable even at the height of British imperial power. From there, an invasion could be swiftly mounted behind the defences of the former empire and their capital would be their last refuge before their fall.

Every major province (bar the Middle and Far East, which had barely begun to be Romanised) was busy recruiting for the huge conflict threatening to break out across Europe. Sicily, Palma, Africa and Capua all needed the call and were effectively doubling the legions available for Numerius when his time came. He had positioned himself in Gaul so that he could command the Western Front in the war, whilst family members were quickly being sent to Greece, Asia Minor and their foothold in Macedon territory (what constituted as the Crimean peninsula today) so everywhere could respond at once.

The continuing Julii deals over Gaul's future reached a historic agreement when for an additional 10,000 denarii, Massilia was added to the Scipii provinces in the area. This left the Julii with no territory within Gaul to manage, and so they could go back to maintain the walls of Italy in the Alpine passes as their borders in the south. Their northern territories remained in their hands also.

This deal had effectively spelled an end to the Julii involvement in the Briton war, meaning Gaul would come under the total control of the Scipii when they were defeated. The Senate was, of course, furious beyond belief that their most trusted servants had not only ignored their plea to give back a traded province, but also enraged over the fact that the Scipii had just purchased another!

Now northern Italy flooded with troops returning in triumph from the frontier, battle hardened and ready to defend their homeland from 'usurpers'. This so spooked the Brutii that their armies actually retreated back to the southern tip of Italy, and from there sailed back to Greece. With one fell swoop, Numerius and his diplomats had secured Gaul for themselves in the years to come, strengthened the Julii's standing when the war eventually would come, and dealt another severe blow to the Brutii and Senate's reputations.

Unsurprisingly, within hours a messenger showed up at the gates of the newly acquired city telling the Scipii to abandon it or 'the censor will investigate'. Given that the Censor was the only remaining post occupied by an independent (and the consul was a suspiciously well placed Brutii), this message was also ignored and the Scipii began co-ordinating the defence of Italy's borders in the mountains with the Julii, who also ran the trade roads through the mountains. Now the Scipii controlled every port in the Mediterranean that wasn't in Italy or in the Brutii empire.

Any celebration either of the two families might have had was interrupted by one of the most urgent and devastating messages the Roman world had ever known:

The Brutii had conquered the Macedonians.

In the weeks that followed, army after army began pouring into the Brutii homelands as their returning forces completed their journey home. Tensions were high and any small provocation would now be tantamount to war.

Unfortunately for the Senate, they chose this time to carry out their threat of investigating the Scipii faction, leading to the tragic suicide of a completely innocent family member called Flavius, whom was beloved across Sicily for his fair and just policies.

Outraged, Numerous demanded the Senate immediately and forever abandon sovereignty over the Scipii and ordered them to pay reparations to his family. The Senate refused. So Nero Scipii (head of one of only two branches of the original Scipii name and commander of Capua) ordered his son Aulus to march with the Home Legion (the Scipii's newly reformed finest army, with a full compliment of Urban Cohorts backed up by Praetorian Cavalry and archers, and even a heavy onager) to Rome. He was authorised by Numerius himself to take Rome and start the war if negotiations failed.

When he began on the way to Rome, Nero took stock of the situation in Italy. He knew that whomever controlled the homeland would almost certainly win the civil war (if only in name; the actual war against both empires would take far longer to complete). The south was occupied by two Brutii cities with barely a civilian guard, as they were so used to being completely safe and secure from the efforts of the Julii. Their capture should prove to be easy.

Northern Italy looked to be far more difficult. Not only was Rome up for grabs (and defended by three large but old fashioned legions) but the rest of the country was controlled by four incredibly strong Julii cities (and their entire military bar one army that defended their northern territories). They also possessed a tiny fishing village on the coast called Segesta, but it was unimportant in the grand scheme of things. Should the Julii fail to ally with the Scipii or remain neutral, Nero could see the war in Italy being incredibly costly, and would almost certainly result in the Julii losing everything, but taking three Scipii men for every Julii lost.

In Gaul, Numerius cancelled his plans of an invasion of Britannia and focused on possessing all of Gaul, to present a united front against the Julii and the Brutii. Unlike Nero, he had no confidence that the Julii would willingly agree serve him and his empire when Rome fell, so the south was fortified and armies built up in the recently aquired cities. With luck, his forces merely had to hold back the Julii from entering Gaul, not wishing to attack their fortifications head on. He relied on Nero to deal with them in Italy. The northern Julii provinces however, he would deal with. Not only would it prevent any chance of their revival later in the war if and when they were knocked out of Italy, but it opened up the Brutii west flank as well.

In Greece, the Second and Fourth legions, (a heavy and a light army respectively) were readying to both take and bypass Athens to move into the empire's heartlands in Macedon. Out East, a legion was encamped in a fort defending the road to Chersonesos (their foothold city in the Crimea), which would be defended until the Armenian war came to an end. When that had occurred, the First and Third legions fighting there would move into Scythian territory (who would hopefully stay neutral) and relieve the defenders. They would then all press into the eastern flank of the Brutii expanse (as all three were heavy legions) and provide the main push through their territory, whilst also helping take out the easternmost parts of the Julii's northern borders.

For this plan to succeed, the Brutii had to assume that the heavy fighting would occur in the West, whilst the Julii had to either stay neutral or believe the same thing. Whilst both fought over Gaul and northern Italy, Rome and Greece would fall to the Scipii and the invasions of both faction's capitals would come from the place they would least expect.

Fortunately for everyone in the Republic, the Senate backed down comically quickly and paid a substantial amount to the Scipii, plus a series of payments were to be made for the next ten years. This was good news, for the Julii had finished recalling all of their armies into Italy and the Brutii had almost completed their recall to Macedon. The Armenians were left with one city (and without the heads of the troublesome king and prince that began that whole ordeal in the desert) and so too had the British in Gaul, leaving many Scipii resources free to begin restocking and preparing moves into Central and Eastern Europe.

War was now inevitable, with all three factions in incredibly strong defensive positions, so much so that the Scipii were fully expecting to lose every battle in Italy for a time, before their superior population, army quality and economy took the strain and battered down the Julii and Senate with troops. With the Brutii, it was less clear how effectively they would defend their empire, but Numerius did not underestimate Brutuis and vice versa.

Only the tapestry of history could tell of what would occur next.


	21. The Line is Crossed

Numerius believed he had found a solution to the question of the civil war. He would create and authorise a state-wide intelligence service that would both maintain his faction's security, spy on the other families and, when all possible weakness had been found, kill every single one of the ruling houses dead.

This aim was aided by the many, many societies and buildings the Egyptians had constructed to house and conceal their own great service: the spy network that was so effective the Egyptians rarely had to lay siege to any city they desired. The gates would merely open at their touch, and they would posses all they desired.

The Scipii thought that they must also have such a system, and so, in deepest secrecy on the island of Cyprus, an elite network of agents and assassins were trained. These people were professionals, not glory seeking gladiators. They desired security of their homes. They wanted the enemies of their friends and families gone.

So 'the Service' was born. It would, in later years, be the Emporer's left hand as much as his legions were his right. At the time, the spies brought interesting news back from their first surveys in the frontier cities. The suspicion that almost all of the Julii army was now in Italy was confirmed, with only one army stationed in the north that had been badly weakened by the Britons in the winter. The Brutii had left Italy, for the most part, and had concentrated almost all of their forces into Macedonia and upper Greece.

With this, the indication was that these places would be where the fighting was heaviest, and so the Scipii Greek provinces were given a massive amount of gold to build up their city walls to Roman standards, whilst Capua was evacuated of many of ite people and Sicily took over the role as the centre of administration for the empire (it was also at this point that the Scipii began transforming it into a second Cyprus, with the entire island becoming a gigantic citadel of sorts). Italy was the critical point of the coming war and yet it was the one place in the world the Scipii were few in number. So Nero fully expected his city to be besieged many times over until the Julii could be beaten back. The Home legion was nearly complete and under the command of his son (whom had been tutored by his uncle, coincidentally also called Aulus) with orders that they were, if the situation arouse, to leave the city to its fate and save themselves.

Gaul's last barbarian territory was now within Numerius' sights and with no Julii in sight, the town was placed under siege. More spies reported in, and the news was certainly not to Numerius' liking. The Brutii had fortified their border in Germania and now both of their frontier cities (the two provinces splitting the Julii territories) were defended with large stone walls and their own _legion each. _The Julii had transformed all four of their home cities into massive fortresses, capable of shrugging off many armies before falling and each defended by a heavy legion, with all the rest encamped around Italy and the Alpine border walls.

Scipii-owned Gaul however, was still beset with poorly constructed towns and villages built by barbarian hands. The Western Front would be an unbelievably bloody campaign should the war begin before the Scipii had a chance to rebuild and defend the settlements and people they now held responsibility for. With Numerius' forces being the only legion in Gaul, this was a problem he could not ignore. So orders were sent out to form light legions in southern Gaul immediately (the infrastructure there was not yet capable of gathering together anything better). It was hoped that this would be enough.

The last charge of the Armenian's also occurred at this time. The new king, in his sixth decade no less, decided to go out in a blaze of glory, with a full army at his back. His kingdom was surely lost, and now he merely wished to make the Romans pay by killing as many of them as possible. By his time however, the Armenian advantage of heavy archer cavalry had been undermined by tried and tested Roman tactics. Despite this, both sides had equal numbers and victory was no guarantee for the Romans, particularly against these people.

The hills of the desert were no refuge for the Armenians however, and their king and army were cut down. Their last ruler dead, and their last army gone, the Armenians surrendered and their city was put to the torch.

Armenia's last defeat marked the end of the war in the east (for now) and the start of a much longer peace than the one following Egypt's defeat. The last British city in Gaul now came into focus and was attacked by Numerius soon afterwards. Like the easterners, the British had placed a whole army of their best troops in their last stronghold on the mainland. It fell as it inevitably would however, and Gaul was Roman ruled in full at last

With Gaul conquered and the East now firmly under heel, the Scipii could finally concentrate their full focus and force on the rest of the Republic. The upheavals in Rome and the three costly wars they had fought had unfortunate consequences for the Scipii. Their economy was in shambles yet again, so badly as to make Gaius' fiscal deficits look tame in comparison. Despite a tremendous military spending budget and massive recruitment targets, their military was _still_ smaller than the Brutii legions, and the Julii had managed to keep up with their expansions in the army fairly easily also.

No matter. Numerius rode back to Capua to take stock of his empire and to bask in the glory of his victories. He prayed at the temple of Saturn, the Titan that had led them to so much greatness, and then on to Poseidon's temple by the port, whom had granted them the ocean as theirs to sail and protect. However, when he reached the '_Consul's Residence_' (which was in actuality more of an imperial palace of greek design), he found a surprise waiting for him. Brutius, the leader of the Brutii.

Brutius did not mince words. Stepping forth from the entranceway he entreated the ruler to ignore the Senate's will and to remain peaceful in his intentions.

Seeing the panic in his eyes, Numerius pushed past him and entered the house, only to find a message from the senate.

Demanding his suicide.

The Urban Cohorts acted as one, seizing the Brutii leader and pinning him against the door. Brutuis yelled that he had nothing to do with the decree and what's more, Marcus, head of the Julii clan, had sent him a message begging him not to march on Rome.

Numerius ordered the Cohorts to sit the other leader down in a chair and they drank together. It seemed that, whilst he had been away in Gaul, Marcus had been in the Northern Territories putting down a rebellion. He had narrowly escaped assassination from a senatorial ambush. Brutius, whom had been away as well in Greece, also had nearly died from a poison attack. Both sent their spies to find out what the Senate was doing. In the absence of the Scipii half of the body (whom were still somewhat surrounded in the citadel), the Julii-elected Senate had defected and decided to take back Italy from the 'invaders and usurpers'.

The plan was to kill the three faction heads, fabricate false information about each faction attacking the other and then incite rebellions in Italy whilst the leaderless armies fought against each other. It was a foolish, cowardly plan but both men knew it might have worked, considering the antagonistic relationship they had, plus the fact that their faction heirs were mere boys of men yet, not ready to assume any kind of leadership role.

What then, were the Romans to do? Marching on Rome together would only complicate things, as everyone had a stake in creating a biased Senate for them. Destroying Rome entirely was NOT an option, as the capital was near and dear to all Roman hearts. No...they had to be crafty and cunning themselves, or they would go to war and everything they had fought hard for would be lost.

Numerius considered the proposal for five minutes in silence. No one, not his guards, not his son, not Brutuis and not the Senate knew what he would decide. Finally, he spoke again. He told Brutuis that if Rome had no honour left within its walls, than Rome was dead and gone, and something else had grown in its place.

Numerius said he was going to march on Rome and that the Brutii and Julii can make of that what they will. Brutuis didn't argue with him further, knowing that his mind was made up. He did however, shake the other leader's hand, for they had both been worthy commanders and leaders of men and would now be worthy adversaries. He then left with a straight spine on his horse, knowing full well that his empire could not win a war against the Scipii.

The absence of men of his caliber was the real reason why the Republic fell and why, in the end, the whole Roman world had to come to an end.


	22. The Roman Civil War: Numerius Outplayed

Numerius acted quickly, setting up his own son as commander of the Home legion (he had recently come of age in Capua) with Aulus reassigned to the southern Italian border with the Brutii. Another legion was being formed there to take out the two enemy cities in the region as soon as the Brutii declared war (it was assumed they would do so as soon as the siege of Rome began).

Nero hunkered down in Capua, with no one leaving the city apart from troops going to Aulus. The Home Fleet then prowled round the port like a mother lioness, and most if not all trade traffic stopped flowing. Sicily dropped off its invasion fleet in the south of Italy and then set about preparing the economy for a war footing once again.

The legions in Gaul were almost ready, with only a minor British rebellion causing annoyance in the south. Numerius himself had hurried back there whilst the borders were open. Riding past the many and varied Julii defences did not dishearten him but merely stiffen his resolve that Italy would no longer need these walls and legions to defend herself with. The age of infighting would end with triumph and control. Rome would rule the world and the world would be Roman.

The conquering heavy legion that Numerius commanded was barely above half strength, yet it was the finest and most experienced fighting force in the world (rivalled only by the Home legion, and only then because of its use as a 'flagship' army). They faced up against a Brutii light army in the centre of the border between the two empires. Whilst Numerius was riding swiftly towards them, they scored another victory by finally finding and beheading the leader of the Briton resistance in Gaul. Had he escaped to the island, he could have well united his homeland and the West would be in even _further_ war.

The legion in Narbo Martius set out for the bridge bordering the Julii alpine defense walls. The wall guards from both sides had surrendered their authority to the legion commanders on both sides, and now the Julii as well as the Brutii were staring at the Scipii, waiting for Numerius to blink.

On the seas, the Scipii were preparing (in deepest secrecy), the greatest instrument of war ever constructed. The Corvus Quinquireme was the most powerful ship in the world, capable of taking on the finest of the Scipii First Fleet _on its own_. And Numerius had orders sent to replace every heavy ship in the navy with these. No one could possible match the Scipii again so long as there were a few of these floating fortresses in the water. Even the British Imperial Navy (what remained of it), would not hold against them.

The Scipii were making moves everywhere, using the full scale of their empire to their enemies' despair. The Julii could only hope to hold them back should the Scipii come through the mountains and attack their walls and forts. Without that, they were only a tough little nation of warriors, no match for the great power in the water.

Brutuis however did not despair, but chose instead to fight the Scipii on his terms. Every single legion he had in Greece was sent out to the eastern borders, with only three remaining in the homeland under his command. Twenty three fully manned legions were now storming towards the Scipii-held East, with many more smaller armies following in their wake.

Numerius was completly outplayed. He had depended on a hard fight in Europe over small pieces of land whilst his few heavy legions would take the whole of the eastern Brutii empire with ease. Now the enemy had turned this around on him, with the Scipii deployed in force around the homelands of both other factions but their own frontiers defenceless. Now the lives of everyone in the easternmost part of the empire depended upon the three legions watching the two mountain passages into the Steppes. If they fell, no one would survive in the war torn countries embroiled in the war.

The war had not yet begun and yet all sides had sent a clear message to the others: this would not be easy.

The Brutii had the manpower to defend everywhere, making the Scipii advantage of mobility seem weak in comparison. The Julii merely had to hunker down and defend their turf to survive the war, with neither of the other powers wishing to awaken a sleeping giant that held domain over Italy. And the Scipii? They were clearly the superior empire and great power, with many supporters on both sides of the walls. They remained unbeaten on land and unchallenged at sea. Defeating them would be an impossibility Brutuis recognised, and so his plan was to merely make the East collapse once more into civil war and play kingmaker with the cities and provinces that won. Taking the former Macedonian port in the Crimea and the southern Greek cities were key as well, as once removed, only one border remained with the Scippi: the natural Rhine frontier.

Whether the Scipii generals would have agreed with that arrangement or not, Numerius certainly never would have and so, as the world held its breath, he sent orders to his son to take Rome as his own. He could no longer afford to waste time as the east of the map filled with Brutii troops. He could no longer ignore the cries of help from his senators. The Scipii were marching to Rome one last time.

From that moment, the civil war had begun.


	23. The Roman Civil War: A United Stand

The first battle of the war came (quite appropriately) on the plains of Thermon outside the Greek city. The two legions in Greece had marched to besiege Athens and block the major crossroads to the east of Thermon, and the Brutii response was ready and harsh. Two armies faced the Scipii legion on the road, whilst Athens was willing to fight to the death against their besiegers.

It is this first phase of the war that proves (from a historical perspective) that this was really a war fought between the Brutii and the Scipii, no matter what the 'actual' cause was. Both empires had been preparing to fight for decades and even though the Senate was the instigator of war, it was between these two factions where all the interests lay.

Brutuis was uneasy in Greece. Thermon and Athens were strong and strategically placed powerhouses that he could not afford to lose if he wished to keep what remained of his Greek provinces. Unfortunately, there were only three generals left in the area apart from himself, and all were nearing seventy in age. They were the original warriors whom fought in the peninsular against the Macedonians and were willing to defend what had become their home, but they were past their prime and knew death awaited them in the field.

Disquiet ran amok among the troops of both sides. Romans had never fought with anything more than words and poised before. Now the precedent had been established, they would never stop infighting until one faction ruled all. Battle commenced though, and not one word of protest was heard when the order to charge was given.

The Scippi army was a light legion. The Brutii army was most certainly a heavy outfit filled to the brim with armour and power. This made an infantry battle a terrible prospect for the Scipii, whilst the Brutii were outmatched in cavalry. The first stage of the battle was a horrific bloodbath then, with each side killing the other in equal number. Whilst the main Brutii force fought, killed and died fighting the Scipii, a second small army under one of the three commanders came behind the lines to the rear of the Scipii and waited for a signal from the generals. When both of them died in the ongoing brawl, they waited for the Scipii to near victory over the main force before charging in with their own three cohorts and a heavy cavalry wing.

Seeing this, the Scipii knew their time had come. Victory had been snatched from them and all they could do now was make the Brutii pay for it dearly. With only four heavily depleted infantry platoons left and a handful of archers, they bravely faced the oncoming enemy from atop a small hill. Their cavalry was limping around the bottom of it, trying to avoid attention from the enemy. A final charge blew through their battle line and ended the battle with a horrible clang.

The three old generals had done their duty and one had even survived to bring victory. The Scipii had lost the first battle of the war and their first battle on the land, and it was against the Brutii. Brutuis was pleased but restrained in victory. He knew his heavy legion had fought a light army, and not the main force as they had claimed. Still, a sign from the Roman gods and a boost to the troops morale was pleasing even if it was at great cost.

Numerius was shocked by the news. This battle had left him the weaker of the two men in the war in Greece, without a second legion to aid the first. Athens was now even more important to the Greek Campaign, as it would be the key defence for the south of Greece now. In vengeance, the timetable for the invasion of southern Italy was brought up and soon the army that had been posted in the mountains came down and laid siege to the two Brutii cities on the mainland.

Rome was another problem entirely. With three large armies guarding it from within and around, the Scipii could not lay siege directly. Instead, Numerius' son encamped on the road to Rome and waited for war to be declared. If the Senate wished to keep its port open or repel the invading army, it would have to leave the safety of the walls.

Additional stimulus came when all three families rebelled from the Senate and were outlawed. Now alone, Rome was even weaker. The Senate had clearly gone insane from some curse, but no man possessed any patience for them any longer. The Julii left for their lands, with Scipii diplomats chasing after them. It was _imperative_ now that they stayed out of this war, or sided with the Scipii. Allying with the Brutii was unacceptable.

The diplomats arrive but almost before they could begin speaking, Nunerius himself burst in. Speaking aloud to the hall filled with the heads of the Julii, he spoke of the great kinship and brotherhood their families shared. How each had aided the other at every dark moment in history. How today, they could stand together once again.

* * *

An extract from an eyewitness:

* * *

_'Friends! Romans! We who have been brothers and family for many a year, in battle and in office, in war and in peace!_

_There are those, in that great city of Rome, who believe that we can be fooled into fighting each other instead of them! There are those who believe honour, friendship and victory can be bought like a whore on the street! _

_They are WRONG!_

_Today, I march on that seat of hedonism and debauchery that should be our finest achievement. Today, I restore the Republic and Rome to the former glory we have spent our lives and fortunes protecting. Today, I ride._

_WHO WILL JOIN ME? WITH WHOM SHALL I RIDE, NOT FOR THEIR PRIDE AND THEIR GREED, BUT FOR THE PEOPLE, AND FOR ROMULUS, AND FOR EVERY DROP OF BLOOD WE HAVE BLED TOGETHER?_

_I call upon you to fight with us once more. To be great once more. And when it is over, we shall be partners on this earth, with none but the gods above us in the skies.'_

* * *

Applause sounded in the chamber like a crashing of brass and fire. Roars of battle and triumph rang out, and Maximus, the leader of all the Julii, came out and swore to stand with Numerius, into the heart of Hades itself if needs be.

Another voice sounded above all the happy gathering. All turned towards the great door in shock, as Brutuis rode in on his mighty horse. Dismounting, he strode towards Numerius and Maximus. Ignoring the screeching of drawn swords, he stood tall and proud as he began his own speech:

* * *

_'Stop! In the name of Jupiter, stop! Listen to my words now, as you have listened to his._

_This past few days have seen the first battle amongst Romans in our fine history. It should prove well that it will be our last. Look at the results! Two entire armies of fine men cut down over a border dispute? This is not war, nor glorious. It is a tragic judgement sent by the gods informing us to never again fight between ourselves._

_You family,_ [he then said, turning to Numerius] _and mine, have not always seen eye to eye. Neither one of us is blameless for past angers and feuds. But even as brothers fight, they do not kill without committing most sacrilegious evil. There is no room in my heart for hatred of you. It is filled with the fear of what we two could create with our war. Think of it! Every battle of ours becoming a slaughter of both sides! In seeking peace, we would make a desert for our few surviving children to suffer in._

_No...now I know that both you and I were wrong to believe we can rule this world alone. It is Rome's destiny to do such a thing, and so long as we are divided, we are not Roman. Those fools, those madmen in their great palaces we built for them, it is THEY whom we should fight...together. _

_And when they fall, all Rome will see us three, Julii, Scipii and Brutii together again, as our founding fathers intended! And we will make new law and governance. Together, Rome shall rule this world and all will glory the gods for their wisdom in showing us how._

_But what now Numerius? It is to you it seems, that Fate has placed with her hands into the lead. What shall it be, war or reclamation? For your children, and mine, shall reap whatever it is you sow today.'_

* * *

The hall lay silent. A collective breath was being held by all, the wind was softly billowing around the door in anticipation. The gods themselves were present, or so it seemed. The world at last was within the hands of Numerius, and he considered it weightily.

The records also tell of what happened next.

* * *

_'So...this is my reckoning. My time of destiny. _

_But what would they will me to do, Brutuis? These gods? Our fathers? _

_I do not know. _

_You come to me now, after everything both I and my father have done to bring destruction down upon you...offering peace?_

_Peace! I hardly know the word now. Such is the world I have lived in. For twenty years I have led these Romans to naught but victory. For twenty years I have loathed you and your empire...as indeed it is..._

_What do I say to this offer? _

_Rome. Rome and Rome again are the source of our troubles! They have held the Julii too tightly in their grasp, they have judged me a tyrant because I am successful and they ignore the Brutii for finding solace in beautiful Greece and not Italy._

_My hate for you is as a small spring is to a river of the disgust I have for those senators. What god do they follow whom allows them this madness? Who feeds their greed so? Ah...it was the Scipii, the Brutii and the Julii, was it not? We who fed them, clothed them, defended them from their enemies. They have never suffered an inconvenience, never lost sleep over their many murderous orders._

_You will ride with us Brutuis. We will make a new peace that can last, and a better world for it to live in. Rome shall be under my safe keeping-Ah! Do not rise, my new friend. It shall be under my stewardship then, but the Senate shall be its rulers. We three shall provide them, and they shall be men of character and strength. There shall be no fresh faced youths with no experience, no old fat men who have not earned every meal they consume._

_Yes...we will ride. For Rome and for Victory!'_

* * *

The silence was thrown off like a cloak as the lords yelled and cheered as one. Arm in arm, the first time in far too many a year, the three great houses swarmed from the great hall and the news spread faster than any man or beast, as if the gods themselves were cheering too.,

The Roman people were coming back to reclaim Rome, together as one people at last.


	24. The Roman Civil War: Reclaiming Rome

***Note, _everything_ in this story (that can happen in-game), occurred in-game too.***

So the three houses were united under a banner of friendship. But for Asinius Scipio, Numerius' son, news had not yet come of that hope from the north. His fort on the road to Rome was being attacked by the most unlikely of foes, his distant cousin Herius Scipio, of the Senate.

The timing here could not have been more critical. Should the Senate lose one of their three huge armies, they would not posses enough of a force to defend Rome properly. Should their whole army be destroyed, the people of the city would riot even more strongly than they would when they would learn of the nature of the opponent they were fighting, their own liberators from the tyranny of a corrupt senate.

With siege engine and archer fire, the Senatorial legion was shattered before it reached the walls. There they had to contend with the most up-to-date fighting infantry in the world, with weapons that pierced all defence and armour that shrugged off all attack. A lucky onager shot hit Scipio straight through the chest and obliterated the shame upon the great house of Scipii where he stood.

With the enemy confused and scattered, the Urban Cohorts were unleashed and they swiftly destroyed the rest of the enemy army in minutes. The Senate was diminished and the Scipii were once again a credible threat on land as well as on the seas.

But the road to Rome was not the city itself, and once the news finally came to the young general about his father's grand alliance, he quickly ordered his men to march with all haste to the capital city of the Republic to meet with the armies of men. The morale was good now amongst the men and the people in general as a civil war against the Senate was popular by all, instead of the nightmarish scenario about fighting the other great houses.

There was another problem however. Maximus's control over the Julii was not as absolute as the other faction leaders with their empire. Half his legions rebelled and were now following Julius, the Alpine commander. Whilst two of the five legions were defeated by the surprised Scipii legion, the rest eventually overcame and crushed the army and rode back into their old fortifications. The pass now belonged to the Julii again, and the Scipii Legion in southern Gaul was destoryed.

With half his armies no longer under his control (or dead), Maximus' holdings were looking weaker and weaker even as they rode through his strongest settlements towards Rome. Brutuis and Numerius were still too distrusting of each other to notice however, with each keeping their armies far away in the marching column and never letting their guard down for a moment. Still, the Julii were now not strong enough to survive a war against either of the other two factions and were thus even more committed to the alliance. The fact that this rebellion had happened however meant that talks of peace between the three leaders became grimmer. It was just too unrealistic to believe there would not be another war unless Rome was placed back under the control of a Senate, but who would watch them?

And who would watch the watchers?

Numerius, now nearing fifty years of age, was doggedly demanding the stewardship of Rome for his empire. The Senate would be held in Rome, and the Republic would continue, with all three factions subject to their laws, but each would be an independent state otherwise, and would each provide gold and troops for a new Senate, that would represent the people fairly and be capable of protecting the city without Julii aid.

Yet Numerius' wanted Rome to be his capital, as well as the capital of the Republic. The others refused on principle and because if they conceded this, they knew it would appear as if they were submitting to the Scipii somewhat. So the experienced leader changed tactics and instead suggested that Rome would belong to the Scipii for the first ten years after its capture. This was supposedly to ensure the city was rebuilt to be a worthy capital of the world and also because then it meant the great ports would fall under Scipii control and therefore recieve all the benefits of that. None of his troops would be allowed to stay in the city past the first week of occupation. All police forces and soldiers would be raised and trained from the populace itself (which was actually Scipii standard practice, established by Cornelius).

It might be a wonder why the other two leaders accepted this plan, but one must remember the situation at hand. The Julii had not the economy to restore Rime to her former glory nor now the manpower to defend the Senate's lands as they were rebuilt into a better system. The Brutii were not welcome in Rome, having been oppressive in the past and seen more so than the Scipii as the cause of the war. In addition, their empire had just barely finished securing itself after tripling in size after the Macedonian war. Their money and manpower was needed elsewhere.

So like it or not, the Scipii would _have_ to take the brunt of the work and pay most of the costs to start with. With the Julii homeland and some trusty Brutii cities nearby, Numerius couldn't work all of his mischief and certainly wouldn't hold onto Rome forever. So the deal was cast and the parchment signed. Now there were two things to do.

First, Rome must be taken for the Alliance and the Senate put to death. Numerius successfully pleaded that his half of the Senate (still under siege in the Citadel) should not be killed but merely retired and moved away from Rome. No trace of the old way would be left as a new order was wrought.

Second, and more delicately, the Julii rebellion must be put down. Whilst Maximus was reticent about fighting his own people, Numerius was adamant that it be ended, or Gaul would put them down for him, and take the Alpine passes the Julii family had abandoned to the rebellion. Brutuis quietly advised Maximus to send what he had to the Gaul border to begin the fighting. No disputes would be tolerated amongst the Alliance now. All Romans had to stand untied or be destroyed utterly. Only then could they rule.

It was at this time (though Numerius would only discover this much later on), that Julius began communicating with the Britons about giving them their old empire back...

As the Aliance rode over the last hill before Rome, the great city was spread out before them like a map. But it was not the flag of the Senate nor the purple hue that greeted their eyes, but the royal sea blue of the Scipii! Asinius Scipio had met and defeated all three armies of Rome at the same time less than two days before, taking the city with not a drop of Roman blood gracing the streets. His was a name that would live in in glory and the Scipii were now the masters of Rome and beloved by her people. When the other leaders saw the adoration of the crowds and the bloodied swords of the men, half exhausted from their killing, their hearts first shrank in fear before being emboldened by the sight of the Citadel opening and the true senators greeting them like heroes.

No matter what had happened or what would happen between those three families, today they were not Julii, or Brutii or Scipii but Roman, and proud ones at that.


	25. Triumph and Aftermath

In the weeks and months after the liberation of Rome, much rejoicing was to be found across the whole of the Roman world...that is to say, the whole world!

The Senate was reconfigured to include fifty members from each house, plus extra members based on populations of cities. Whilst there were of course three main political parties, independents and minority parties were also encouraged and popular enough to exist.

The question of who should own and lead Rome was answered for the three family leaders by the fact that none of them had taken Rome, clearly, the gods wished Asinius to decide Rome's fate, at least for now. So it was that he became First Emperor of the Roman Empire, a combination of the Julii homelands and colonies, the Brutii Empire and the Scipii Empire. All swore eternal loyalty to him and to the people of the Empire, and all three factions continued to exist as semi-autonomous states.

In time, Brutuis and Numerius became companions and friends, each saving the other's life in the British incursion into Gaul and the following war to destroy that enemy for good. Numerius became Rome's greatest hero after Asinius (though Brutuis was never far behind him in the public's estimations) and earned his title of 'the Great'.

Maximus never ruled a truly united faction again, as Julius went to the Emperor himself to ask for clemency. He was granted it, plus all Julii colonies in Northern Germania, starting the ongoing and fierce rivalry the German and Italian people share to this day.

Maximus died to extreme old age and his sons fell warring against the Scythians, whom eventually became a vassal and buffer state against the Steppe regions and beyond. The Julian family disintegrated and the Emperor took over Northern Italy for himself, starting the unification of Italy which would be competed when Numerius the Great gifted Capua to his son on his deathbed.

The Brutii continued to expand eastwards, to the consternation of the Scythains. Their capital of Byzantium was said to be almost a second Rome, its wealth and power unmatched in the East. The border regions between Gaul and Brutii territory were ceded to Julius' heirs and became Germania in full once again, uniting a people that began to see themselves as German and Brutii Roman, not Italian (a trait common amongst the kingdom's and peoples of central and Eastern Europe in the present day. Western Europe, Africa and Asia Minor meanwhile, hold common Scipii backgrounds).

The Brutii thrived for generations after Brutuis, whom was venerated by all for not only founding their own empire but for saving both it and the entire Roman world by creating the Roman Empire it served.

As for Numerius, he sailed to Britain and made war with the inhabitants for the rest of his life. Pictland proved to be too far for even the Romans, and he admitted defeat and returned to Londinium, which he transformed into a city greater than even Rome. Its walls were said to be indestructible, the streets flooded with gold and silver, and the ships produced in the docklands were larger than castles. The ageing man fell in love with the harsh but beautiful land he found himself in, and gave his title away to Nero (as Asinius could not be his heir any longer but founder of a line of emperors) and the Scipii empire was split between the great power and the small but mighty island province Numerius was building with care.

Rome reigned as the world's capital city, and everyone was happy and at peace.

* * *

Historian's note:

_The Roman Empire was founded in the year before our Lord 148BC. Its strength and size was rarely ever increased, owing to the astonishing completeness of Brutii and Scipii conquests before its inception, but Scythia was penetrated and expanded into until it too was Roman, whilst the African colonies descended ever downwards till the great desert blocked all passage._

_The Empire was a marvel that few could imagine today. There was little to no crime. Poverty was a monster confined to the largest of the cities and rarely reared its ugly head again until the end times. The roads, buildings and walls constructed by the great craftsman remain unrivalled to this day. _

_The Scipii, the most liberal of all the powers in play in the empire, nurtured the three religions of Islam, Judaism and Christianity into the flames of the world that they are fast becoming today. The Empire had three main religions, that of Christianity, the Roman Pantheon and Paganism, but Islam and Judaism survived in the eastern provinces and would return in force when the empire fell. _

_The fall came, as it inevitably would, with first a plague and then a war._

_A sickness which began in Africa and Iberia spread across the Empire with dizzying speed and force, killing millions and more. The Emperor fell, as did half the Senate and all the heads of houses. This crisis of population and chaos was doubled when invaders from the wild hills of the east destroyed much of the Brutii force and sacked Brutuisanium (a renamed Byzantium), renaming it Constantinople after their rebel leader, whom proceeded to destroy the Eastern Roman world and breached even Scipii territory before the new Emperor Tiberius could stop him. By then, the empire was crumbling and every province was rebelling. _

_Soon there came an age of darkness that only the great Church illuminates with its holy records and teachings. I have studied these scrolls and it is clear to me what happened next. For Iberia, Gaul, Germania and Italy, their cultures were distinct now. Naturally they coalesced into kingdoms and city states of their own. Only the Germans have attempted to cling to their past Roman lives, but the rest seem content to move on and leave the greatness of a united Europe behind in their hubris. _

_The Papacy rules in Rome now, and rules wisely. The best of the Brutii and Scipii managed to escape and reform somewhat in the East, renaming their city back to Byzantium and continuing to rule as true Romans should. Africa is a wasteland now, full of plague and desert and Muslims, as if their gods of death really had strolled through that land, devouring all that made it beautiful. In the East, the Muslim menace, as the 'powers' in Europe call them, are moving to create their own empires based off of the knowledge they saved from the fall._

_And what of that mysterious Isle of Numerius? That too has fallen from grace, as have we all. Yet Londinium **exists**__ still. Its libraries, its walls are intact. The knowledge lies __**there**__, unknown by the ignorant barbarian locals, to rebuild what was lost. _

_The King of France is a weak minded fool. He commands not the loyalty of myself nor my men. Just as my kinsmen in Sicily have deemed to unite Italy once more, so shall I remake Britain to what Numerius wished. I shall take the Isle that was promised to me, for God and for my people. I shall rebuild that squalid little kingdom into a great Christian nation, and then I shall unite Europe as we were always meant to be._

_I am William. And by my will and that of God, the Roman Empire shall rise again._


End file.
